An Atlanta woman considered the mastermind of a “staggering” scheme that defrauded Amazon out of nearly $10 million has been sentenced to 16 years in federal prison, the U.S. Department of Justice said Wednesday.
Kayricka Wortham, 32, was also ordered to pay just under $9.5 million in restitution after she pleaded guilty in November to a federal charge of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia Ryan K. Buchanan said in a news release.
Wortham, an operations manager at Amazon’s Smyrna warehouse, ran the scheme with the help of her girlfriend, 37-year-old Brittany Hudson. Wortham was originally scheduled to be sentenced in March, but she and Hudson both had their bonds revoked after they were accused in a second fraud scheme earlier this year, Buchanan said. The couple have since been indicted on new fraud charges for allegedly using fake and forged documents in an attempt to open a restaurant and hookah lounge franchise.
In addition to Wortham and Hudson, five other co-defendants have been charged in the Amazon scheme, Buchanan said. The couple have already surrendered the trappings of their lavish lifestyle funded by the millions they stole, including a Smyrna home bought for $900,000 and a fleet of luxury vehicles that included a Tesla, Porsche and Lamborghini.
“The defendant abused her position of trust at Amazon to steal nearly $10 million from the company based on a brazen fraud scheme involving fake vendors and fictitious invoices,” Buchanan said about Wortham. “She then committed new crimes while on bond, even creating a fake dismissal document purporting to be from the court and that included the forged signature of the Chief U.S. District Judge, all for the purpose of misleading a franchising company about the status of her criminal charges. Her prison sentence recognizes the magnitude of her fraud and serves to protect the integrity of our courts and justice system.”
According to Buchanan, Wortham’s responsibilities in her supervisory role at Amazon included approving new vendors and invoice payments. Hudson owned a business called Legend Express LLC that contracted with Amazon to deliver packages for the company. Over a period of about 18 months, they submitted millions of dollars worth of fake invoices that Wortham subsequently approved.
As the ringleader, Wortham recruited other Amazon employees to help with the scheme and paid them with the stolen money, Buchanan said. Demetrius Hines, who worked in loss prevention, and Laquettia Blanchard, a human resources assistant, provided names and social security numbers to use on the fake invoices, he said.
Hines also recruited an operations manager at a different Amazon warehouse in Duluth, Jamar L. James Sr., into the scheme, prosecutors said. James is accused of continuing to approve fake invoices even after Wortham left Amazon in March 2022.
Just two months after pleading guilty to the Amazon fraud charge in November, Wortham was working with Hudson to open a location of the hookah bar franchise Cru Lounge, according to Buchanan. When the franchising company learned about the couple’s recent fraud, Wortham and Hudson claimed that the Amazon-related charges had been dismissed, Buchanan said.
To back up their claims, Wortham and Hudson are accused of sending fake federal court documents to Cru that included the allegedly forged signatures of a Chief U.S. District judge and the Clerk of Court, prosecutors said. Hudson is also accused of sending doctored bank statements and personal financial information that inflated her account balances to the franchising company.
After the Cru franchise scheme was discovered, Wortham and Hudson had their bond revoked.
Hudson was indicted last month on charges of conspiracy, wire fraud, money laundering and forgery, Buchanan said. James was also indicted as Hudson’s co-defendant.
Hines and Blanchard have each pleaded guilty but have not been sentenced, Buchanan said.
Wortham’s 16-year prison sentence will be followed by three years of supervised release, according to Buchanan. There is no parole in the federal prison system.
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