Feds continue to rack up convictions in BEC cases as Georgia man gets 10-year sentence

A Georgia man who stole millions from a state Medicaid program was handed a 10-year prison sentence Tuesday — the latest conviction in a series of federal cases connected to business email compromise (BEC) scams.

Sandy Springs resident Malachi Mullings, 31, used 20 bank accounts opened through a sham company to launder money stolen in BEC and romance schemes. In a BEC scam, the perpetrator typically sends an email impersonating a trustworthy business associate. 

In 2020, Mullings submitted forms to an unnamed agency “for the purpose of changing the bank account information on file for Medicaid payments to certain hospitals,” according to a criminal complaint, resulting in two payments totaling more than $3.8 million. He also extorted a victim in a romance scam for $260,000, which prosecutors say he used to buy a Ferrari. 

The charges against Mullings were announced by the Department of Justice in 2022 as part of a multi-state effort to crack down on scams targeting state and private health insurance providers, with charges brought against 10 people for the alleged total theft of $11.1 million.     

Federal prosecutors have secured convictions in several BEC cases recently, including:

• A four-year sentence for Niselio Barros Garcia, of Florida, for laundering more than $2.3 million from BEC and romance scams.
• A conviction of Okechuckwu Valentine Osuji for overseeing a network of scammers in Malaysia and elsewhere, which allegedly stole more than $6 million from victims.
• The guilty ruling against Milwaukee man Corey Lee, who along with co-conspirators laundered over $1.2 million stolen from four businesses in BEC scams. 

Reports of such schemes have increased dramatically in recent years, with the FBI logging nearly $3 billion in losses in 2023, making BEC the second-most-damaging form of internet crime reported by Americans last year.