Photo Courtesy of the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Eastern District of New York
“This Office and its law enforcement partners will spare no effort in holding the defendants to account for their brazen fraud,” said Acting Brooklyn U.S. Attorney Lesko.
By Forum Staff
Two Queens brothers—Abed Ahmad and Alaa Ahmad—on Thursday pleaded guilty to bank fraud conspiracy and conspiracy to commit aggravated identity theft relating to a scheme to defraud JPMorgan Chase & Co. and its customers.
Abed Ahmad also pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit money laundering and one count of aggravated identity theft.
“The defendants abused their positions of trust at JP Morgan Chase in furtherance of a sordid scheme to steal the identities of elderly and deceased customers in order to misappropriate millions in funds from their accounts,” said Acting Brooklyn U.S. Attorney Mark Lesko. “This Office and its law enforcement partners will spare no effort in holding the defendants to account for their brazen fraud.”
As set forth in court filings and Thursday’s proceedings, between approximately 2012 and 2017, Abed and Alaa Ahmad, 37 and 34, respectively, both of whom worked at branches of JPMorgan Chase & Co. in Queens, used their positions at the bank to target high-dollar value customer accounts of elderly or deceased individuals that had been dormant for a period of time. After identifying these accounts, Abed and Alaa Ahmad passed the account information, as well as the personal identifying information of the account holders, to another co-conspirator, Moustafa Ayoub. Ayoub used the account information to transfer nearly $7 million of victim funds from the JPMorgan Chase accounts to other financial accounts controlled by Ayoub.
Ayoub, 50, previously pleaded guilty in January 2021 to conspiracy to commit bank fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering, conspiracy to commit aggravated identity theft and aggravated identity theft. He is awaiting sentencing.
“These guilty pleas put high-tech cyber thieves on notice: the Manhattan D.A.’s Office has built the expertise, resources, and seamlessly collaborative partnerships to find you, hold you accountable, and secure justice for your victims,” said Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance. “I thank Acting U.S. Attorney Lesko and my Office’s Cybercrime and Identity Theft Bureau for their exceptional collaboration as we continue working together to protect our residents and markets from increasingly sophisticated, large-scale frauds. I also commend my Office’s Forensic Accounting and Financial Investigations Bureau; the NYPD’s Financial Crimes Task Force, Cybercrime and Identity Theft Task Force, and Intelligence Bureau; and our federal partners at IRS and HSI for this expert, joint investigation, as well as the Veterans Affairs OIG and Social Security Administration OIG for their important work.”
John Grasso, Special Agent-in-Charge, Social Security Administration Office of Inspector General, New York Field Office, added, “These guilty pleas are the result of a true collaborative effort between federal and local agencies to identify this massive fraud and hold accountable those who abused their authority for personal gain. These individuals stole these funds not only from private citizens and financial institutions, but also from the Social Security Administration. I want to recognize our law enforcement partners, the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, and the United States Attorney’s Office, for their efforts leading to today’s announcement.”
