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A former manager at Amazon.com who led a brazen phony-invoice scam that cost the company nearly $10 million, has been sentenced to 16 years in federal prison.
Prosecutors say 32-year-old Kayricka Wortham was an operations manager at an Amazon warehouse in Smyrna, Ga., from 2020 until 2022, during which time she created a network of fake vendors in whose name she submitted and approved millions of dollars in bogus invoices. Wortham used the money she stole to buy a fleet of luxury cars and $1 million home, prosecutors said.
According to court papers, Wortham’s job gave her oversight over employees and contracting with outside delivery companies and granted her the responsibility of approving new vendors and signing off on invoices.
“The defendant abused her position of trust at Amazon to steal nearly $10 million from the company based on a brazen fraud scheme involving fake vendors and fictitious invoices,” said Ryan Buchanan, the U.S. attorney for the northern district of Georgia.
Wortham, who also went by Kayricka Dupree and Kayricka Young, pleaded guilty in November 2022, admitting she had submitted $10 million in false invoices for which Amazon paid $9.4 million into accounts she and her co-conspirators controlled.
Wortham represented herself in the case and has been held in jail without bond, so couldn’t immediately be reached. A message left with representatives for Amazon
AMZN,
wasn’t immediately returned.
Prosecutors say Wortham and her girlfriend, Brittany Hudson, used the money to buy a $1 million home in Smyrna, Georgia, a $235,000 Lamborghini Urus, a $100,000 Tesla Model X, a $135,000 Porsche Panamera, a Dodge Durango and a Kawasaki ZX636 motorcycle.
Hudson, 37, who owned a business, Legend Express LLC, that contracted with Amazon to deliver packages to customers, has been charged with conspiracy, wire fraud, and money laundering for her alleged role in the scheme and is awaiting trial.
A message left with an attorney for Hudson wasn’t immediately returned.
In a particularly bold twist, prosecutors say that after Wortham had been charged and released on bond, she and Hudson forged documents — including forging a federal judge’s signature — to make it appear the charges had been dismissed while they applied for a franchise license to open a hookah lounge in Atlanta.
After that fraud came to the attention of the court, the judge revoked the bond for Wortham and Hudson.
Prosecutors had alleged that Wortham also recruited two co-workers to take part in the scheme, including Demetrius Hines, who was a loss prevention expert at several Amazon warehouses in Georgia, and Laquettia Blanchard, who was a senior human resources assistant at the company.
According to court filings, Hines and Blanchard gave Wortham names and Social Security numbers in order to create fake vendor accounts. Prosecutors say Hines also recruited another operations manager at Amazon’s location in Duluth, Ga., who also allegedly approved fake vendors and fictitious invoices, particularly after Wortham left Amazon in March 2022.
Hines and Blanchard have pleaded guilty to wire fraud and are awaiting sentencing.
A message left with an attorney for Hines wasn’t immediately returned and an attorney for Blanchard declined to comment.
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