LOS ANGELES, California, May 16, 2024 (Gephardt Daily) — A Saratoga Springs man has been found guilty of defrauding a California organic produce distributor of $5.8 million over an 18-year period.
Kevin Scott Horton, 56, was found guilty by a jury for participating in a long-running scheme in which he sent fake invoices on behalf of a shell company to defraud a family-owned organic produce distributor out of $5.8 million, the U.S. Justice Department announced this week.
Evidence presented at Horton’s nine-day trial showed the scam ran from February 2000 to April 2018, according to a Tuesday press release from the DOJ’s Central District of California, which was shared online by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for Utah.
“In February 2000, Horton created a shell company called Creative Network Solutions (CNS), whose purpose was to send fraudulent bills to its sole client, Melissa’s World Variety Produce Inc., a Vernon, California company.”
Horton schemed with Tony Anhtuan Rawlings, 57, of Garden Grove, California, the information technology (IT) director at Melissa’s, the DOJ said. The pair defrauded Melissa’s out of its money through the approval of payment of invoices for IT services that were never provided.
“Horton provided the fictitious invoices to Rawlings, who approved them, vouched for their operational necessity, and then forwarded them to a Melissa’s executive who was asked to have Melissa’s pay CNS the amounts listed on the sham invoices.”
Horton is scheduled for sentencing August 5 “at which time Horton will face a statutory maximum sentence of 20 years in federal prison for each mail fraud count,” the DOJ said. He was convicted of seven counts.
Rawlings pleaded guilty in August 2022 to one count of mail fraud. His sentencing hearing is scheduled for June 20. The FBI investigated the case.
