A Virginia man is facing up to 20 years in prison for a scam that started with him switching addresses on mailed packages. It mushroomed into a complex scheme that ultimately included him stealing the identity of the investigator looking into his crimes.
Rohit Jawa pleaded guilty to aggravated identity theft and multiple counts of wire fraud. His crime scheme began in 2013.
Throughout that time, Jawa had at least 19 eBay accounts, its ShipCover insurance, and 18 PayPal accounts, and dozens of 1&1 Mail accounts. His scheme started with him filing insurance claims on empty packages he mailed out, and on packages he said never arrived.
When his crimes caught the attention of the U.S. Postal Service, they assigned an inspector general agent to investigate. Jawa then stole that agent's identity and used it to get into a law enforcement database.
Once in there, he stole personal information from people in that database, to create more fraudulent accounts. Jawa will be sentenced early next year.
