Michael Peterson Sentenced to 5 Years in $5M Fraud Scheme

Michael Peterson, 48, of Alpharetta, Georgia, is going to federal prison for five years after admitting to a brazen wire fraud scheme that looted nearly $5 million from four employers, including a Maryland-based health care provider. On April 26, 2019, U.S. District Judge Catherine C. Blake handed down the sentence, which includes three years of supervised release and an order for Peterson to pay $3.9 million in restitution. The con man exploited trust, titles, and fake corporate identities to bleed companies dry while posing as a top-performing executive.

Peterson pleaded guilty to wire fraud, copping to a four-year scam that ran from March 2014 to March 2018. During that time, he infiltrated companies under the guise of a high-level sales executive, then fabricated contracts with non-existent clients. He created phony email accounts and aliases, impersonating officials from real companies like Mitas Tires North America, Inc. Emails were sent to himself and colleagues to make it appear legitimate deals were in motion. Documents were forged. Deadlines were faked. And checks kept rolling in.

At Company B, headquartered in Glenwood, Maryland, Peterson played the role of Vice President for Business Development and later Vice President of Sales—all while working remotely from his Georgia home. From March 2015 to September 2016, he dangled a fake multi-million dollar contract with Mitas, convincing the company to hire 11 additional employees to handle the phantom deal. He even had co-conspirators step in to impersonate Mitas executives during phone calls, deepening the ruse.

The house of cards began to collapse when Peterson’s boss tried to schedule in-person meetings with Mitas reps. Repeatedly, the meetings were canceled at the last minute. Suspicion turned to certainty when the supervisor drove to what he believed was Mitas’ New Jersey headquarters—only to find an empty lot. No building. No company. No contract. An internal investigation confirmed the truth: the deals never existed. Peterson had manufactured them all. Company B fired him in October 2016.

Across the board, Peterson collected salaries ranging from $115,000 to $150,000 a year, plus commissions, travel reimbursements, and corporate loans—all for work that never happened. The total fraud reached almost $5 million before the deception unraveled. Each employer he duped eventually uncovered the scam and cut ties, but not before suffering serious financial and operational damage.

U.S. Attorney Robert K. Hur, who prosecuted the case through Assistant U.S. Attorney Kathleen O. Gavin, commended the FBI’s Baltimore Field Office for cracking the case. Acting Special Agent in Charge Jennifer L. Moore led the federal investigation. Hur called the fraud “a calculated betrayal of trust,” noting that Peterson’s position of authority made the crime even more egregious. The sentence sends a clear message: fake deals and false identities won’t fly in federal court.

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