Michigan Man Sentenced to 2 Years for Opioid Scam

BOSTON – A Michigan man has been sentenced to two years in prison for running a massive opioid distribution scheme and using a COVID-19 relief loan to fund it.

Donald Nchamukong, 37, of Michigan, was sentenced by U.S. Senior District Court Judge Nathaniel M. Gorton to two years in prison, to be followed by two years of supervised release.

Nchamukong was also ordered to pay $200,000 in restitution for the loan fraud and opioid distribution charges.

Starting in 2019 and continuing to 2022, Nchamukong and co-conspirator Doyal Kalita conspired to distribute opioids, including the Schedule IV opioid tramadol, to customers across the United States using call centers in India and shell companies.

Nchamukong used bank and merchant accounts to process sales of the illegal foreign drugs, and the duo received shipments of tramadol from India and reshipped it to customers, including in Massachusetts.

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, Nchamukong and Kalita fraudulently obtained a $200,000 Economic Injury Disaster Loan to fund their opioid scheme.

Kalita was sentenced to 10 years in prison in June 2024 for orchestrating the online drug distribution scheme and related money laundering.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Kriss Basil, Deputy Chief of the Securities, Financial & Cyber Fraud Unit, prosecuted the case.

The COVID-19 Fraud Enforcement Task Force, established by the Attorney General in May 2021, helped to bring Nchamukong to justice by marshaling resources across government to combat pandemic-related fraud.

Anyone with information about allegations of attempted fraud involving COVID-19 can report it by calling the Department of Justice’s National Center for Disaster Fraud Hotline or submitting a web complaint form.

Valuable assistance was provided by Homeland Security Investigations in New York, the Small Business Administration, and the United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York.

Nchamukong pleaded guilty to conspiracy to smuggle goods into the United States, committing loan fraud, and distributing controlled substances in March 2025.

For more information on the department’s response to the pandemic, please visit https://www.justice.gov/coronavirus and https://www.justice.gov/coronavirus/combatingfraud