A Santee trucking company owner, Hasan Korkmaz, currently faces federal court after being indicted on counts of bank fraud, money laundering, and identity theft crimes that could carry considerable prison time and significant financial penalties. As reported by the U.S. Attorney's Office, Korkmaz, 44, of Las Vegas, NV, is accused of defrauding two banks of more than $2 million through a sophisticated credit card "bust-out" scheme.
The indictment outlines how Korkmaz procured personal data including names, social security numbers, and birthdates to set up numerous credit card accounts in what appears to be a premeditated attack on financial stability and trust, using these cards to siphon funds ultimately laundered including a transfer to a Turkish bank controlled by him, prompting serious scrutiny from the authorities. According to the indictment, Korkmaz's scheme involved making purchases and covering these expenditures with fraudulent payments, crafted to elude detection and maintain a façade of legitimate transactional behavior, all while stacking layers upon layers of transactions in a house of cards bound to collapse.
Given the nature of the charges, Korkmaz faces a maximum of thirty years for bank fraud, twenty years for money laundering offenses, and a mandatory minimum of two years for aggravated identity theft, the last of which must run consecutively with other sentences. The Federal Bureau of Investigation spearheaded the investigation, leading to the charges rendered public through the Justice Department's press release.
