California Trucking Business Owner Admits Guilt in $2.1 Million Scheme
After two banks lose $2.1 million and 100 individuals were defrauded, a Turkish national faces up to 400 years total in a federal prison during sentencing.
On October 15th, Hasan Korkmaz would plead guilty for a $2.1 million for a big identity theft conspiracy. The federal court indicted Korkmaz on 18 charges total. This includes bank fraud (12 counts), identity fraud (4 counts), and money laundering (2 counts).
This fraud scheme ran from 2022 to 2023. During the fraud scheme, Korkmaz would steal personal information from truck drivers and use it to fraudulently process credit cards for up to $18,500 each.
How Korkmaz Ran His Fraud Scheme
The FBI would call it a “Bust-out” scheme. This happens when criminals create what appears as a real credit card account. To give you an idea of how this was run, a bust-out scheme with credit cards typically has 4 distinguished phases:
Opening the account: First, the criminal opens a fraudulent account with what looks like an actual identity, but in truth, it has been stolen.
Building trust: Next, the fraudster will try to appear as low risk as possible, making small fraudulent purchases while paying the balance on time every month.
Inflate: After they appear as a trustworthy lender, the criminal will then ask to raise their credit limit. They might look for cash advances or a high-tier card.
Bust: Finally, the fraudsters’ plan comes to full fruition. They never had any true intention of paying back the debt, but they played the long game. What happens at this point is that the criminal adds the credit to the max. Many times, this happens across multiple credit cards draining every dollar on the account.
That’s basically how the bust-out scheme of Korkmaz was run, or how we suspect it was run. This is how they say bust-out schemes are run, but the court documents never detailed this. Every transaction would reach a total of $18,500. Korkmaz processed the credit card transactions through his own trucking company.
When the FMCSA looked more deeply at Korkmaz, they found a total of three trucks and five drivers. Of this, in 2022, the semi-trucks would drive a total of 2,948,000 miles. Now, if you’re an owner-operator, you understand how grossly exaggerated these miles are. You can’t drive that many miles with 3 trucks legitimately. The HOS system would never allow it.
The industry average in 2022 was 78,863 miles for each truck.
Sentencing Begins on January 8th
A judge is expected to sentence Hassan Korkmaz on January 8, 2027, at 9 AM. The Justice Department never said what banks were victims of the fraud scheme, nor did they explain the exact process of how Korkmaz obtained their personal information. One of the things that this case highlights is how important it is to vet a carrier beyond looking at the active operating authority.
It also highlights why you need to look at financial activity when you evaluate transportation businesses.
What are Your Thoughts
We would love to hear what you think about this $2.1 million fraud scheme with a trucking company being behind it. Do you think the person behind this scheme will receive a lot of time? What do you think would be a just sentence?
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