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Indian National Pleads Guilty in Massive Call Center Scam
Houston, Texas – Bharatkumar Patel, a 43-year-old Indian national, has pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering for his role in a multi-million dollar call center scam targeting US victims.
According to court documents, Patel and his co-conspirators ran a complex scheme in which individuals from call centers located in Ahmedabad, India, impersonated officials from the IRS or U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services in a ruse designed to defraud victims located throughout the United States.
The scammers used information obtained from data brokers and other sources to target US victims who were threatened with arrest, imprisonment, fines or deportation if they did not pay alleged monies owed to the government. Victims who agreed to pay the scammers were instructed how to provide payment, including by purchasing stored value cards or wiring money, and upon payment, the call centers would immediately turn to a network of ‘runners’ based in the US to liquidate and launder the fraudulently-obtained funds.
Patel admitted to purchasing reloadable cards or retrieving wire transfers and using the misappropriated personal identifying information of US citizens. He also admitted to opening personal bank accounts in order to receive scam proceeds and payments from defrauded victims, as well as creating limited liability companies in his name to further the conspiracy.
Patel’s plea agreement states that he opened one bank account that received more than $1.5 million in deposits over a one-year period and another bank account that received more than $450,000 in deposits over a five-month period.
Patel was charged for his role in the fraud and money laundering scheme alongside 55 other individuals and five call centers in an indictment returned by a federal grand jury in the Southern District of Texas on October 19, 2016.
The investigation was led by HSI, DHS-OIG, and TIGTA, with significant support from the Ft. Bend County, Texas, Sheriff’s Office; police departments in Hoffman Estates and Naperville, Illinois, and Leonia, New Jersey; San Diego County District Attorney’s Office Family Protection/Elder Abuse Unit; U.S. Secret Service; U.S. Small Business Administration – Office of Inspector General; IOC-2; INTERPOL Washington; and U.S. Attorney’s Offices in Northern District of Alabama, District of Arizona, Central District of California, Northern District of California, District of Colorado, Northern District of Florida, Middle District of Florida, Northern District of Illinois, Northern District of Indiana, District of Nevada, and District of New Jersey.
Patel is scheduled to be sentenced on July 7, 2017, and has agreed to deportation following his sentence.
Key Facts
- State: Texas
- Category: Fraud & Financial Crimes
- Source: DOJ Press Release â†â€â€
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