Zhao Wang, Multinational Fraud and Money Laundering, California 2024

A California court has sentenced Zhao Wang, a Chinese national, to 12.5 years in prison for leading a $27 million fraud and money laundering scheme targeting over 2,000 elderly victims across the United States. Wang, also known as ‘Oscar,’ was the lead defendant in a five-defendant indictment unsealed in 2024.

According to public documents, members of the conspiracy operated a series of technical support, bank impersonation and government impersonation, and refund scams targeting elderly victims. Victims received unsolicited phone calls, emails, and pop-up ads directing victims to call a phone number. Unbeknownst to the victims, those phone numbers belonged to India-based scam call centers.

Once a victim called the call center, members of the conspiracy used social engineering techniques to build trust with victims. In many instances, the conspirators had victims download commercially available remote desktop software, which the conspirators used to access victims’ computers and to carry on the scams.

One of the most frequent scams was a refund scam. In the refund scams, victims were told they were entitled to a small refund, for example, from a retailer for an alleged unauthorized charge. While pretending to process the refund, the victim would be accidentally ‘over-refunded’ money. The conspirators would then instruct the victim to send the alleged over-refunded money through wire transfers or in cash via express mail to members of the conspiracy.

Victims were instructed to send the alleged over-refunded money via wire transfers and in bulk cash via express mail packages to members of the conspiracy, including defendant Zhao Wang, in the United States. When a victim was duped into sending bulk cash in the mail, Wang would provide his India-based co-conspirators a fictitious name plus an address of a retail location that could accept express mail packages.

Investigators identified over 2,000 elderly victims from throughout the country, including victims in San Diego, who were defrauded and suffered over $27 million in losses over an approximately two-year period between 2021-2023. Wang’s sentencing comes after the government argued that he oversaw the U.S.-based operation, including co-conspirators who would retrieve victim packages and document themselves retrieving and opening packages and counting the money inside.

At sentencing, the government emphasized that Wang was explicit that his operation was, in his own words, scamming elderly Americans. Wang admitted that he laundered the money using cryptocurrency back to his foreign-based counterparts. He took upwards of 18 percent of the fraud proceeds and transferred the rest via cryptocurrency to his co-conspirators.

Wang also admitted that he laundered the proceeds to promote the fraud scheme by using fraud proceeds to pay co-conspirators and to purchase the fake IDs used in the scheme. This sentence recognizes the profound human cost of exploiting trust and treating vulnerable people as opportunities for profit.

The case serves as a reminder of the importance of protecting our most vulnerable citizens from financial exploitation.

Source: https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdca/pr/chinese-national-and-ringleader-sentenced-125-years-27-million-multinational-fraud-and