Thursday, June 6, 2013

San Francisco Man Indicted in Data Hosting Scheme

SAN FRANCISCO—Yesterday, a federal grand jury in San Francisco indicted Bruce Lee Marshall, of San Francisco, for mail fraud, United States Attorney Melinda Haag announced. Despite being ordered to appear in court this morning, Marshall failed to appear for his arraignment and is currently a fugitive.
According to the indictment, Marshall, 38, defrauded his employer, an education technology company, of more than $100,000 by tricking his employer into believing it was sending checks to a data hosting company when, in fact, they went directly to Marshall. Marshall allegedly created a fake contract reflecting that the costs of his employer’s data hosting services were up to $16,000 per month, when, in fact, Marshall had entered into a different contract costing only $1,000 per month for data hosting services. Marshall allegedly created fraudulent invoices to be sent to his employer directing his employer to send payment to Touch Fiber Network and Human Engineering Services (aka HE Services), entities he controlled. In all, Marshall allegedly fraudulently caused his employer to pay his companies more than $100,000.
The investigation began in 2011 when aspects of this alleged fraud were charged against Marshall as a violation of his supervised release for a prior federal passport fraud conviction. Yesterday, Marshall was ordered to appear in court this morning for arraignment on the current charges. He failed to appear as ordered, however, and he is currently a fugitive. If anyone has information regarding his whereabouts, please call the San Francisco Field Office of the FBI at (415) 553-7400.
The maximum statutory penalty for mail fraud in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 1341, is 20 years in prison and a fine of $250,000, plus restitution. However, any sentence following conviction would be imposed by the court after consideration of the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and the federal statute governing the imposition of a sentence, 18 U.S.C. § 3553.
Robert Rees is the Assistant U.S. Attorney who is prosecuting the case with the assistance of Rawaty Yim. The prosecution is the result of an investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Please note, an indictment contains only allegations against an individual and, as with all defendants, Marshall must be presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.

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