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April 11, 2025 ¨D The former longtime head of the accounting department at the now-shuttered downtown Los Angeles plaintiffs¡¯ personal injury law firm Girardi Keese was sentenced today to 121 months in federal prison for enabling the embezzlement of millions of dollars from the firm¡¯s injured clients and for embezzling money from the law firm itself.

May 7, 2024 ¡ª A resident of Fort Lauderdale, Florida, was sentenced in federal court to 120 months of imprisonment, to be followed by three years of supervised release, and was ordered to pay more than $97 million in restitution and to forfeit more than $30 million and the proceeds from the sale of a yacht for conspiring to commit health care fraud and conspiring to pay and receive unlawful kickbacks, First Assistant United States Attorney Troy Rivetti announced today.

January 4, 2023 ¡ª The orchestrator of a nationwide conspiracy that facilitated cheating on college entrance exams and the admission of students as fake athletic recruits to elite universities ¨C including Georgetown, Stanford, the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), the University of Southern California (USC), the University of Texas, Wake Forest and Yale ¨C was sentenced today in federal court in Boston.

June 28, 2022 ¡ª U.S. District Judge John A. Mendez sentenced Paulette Carpoff, of Martinez, to 11 years and three months in prison for her role in the biggest criminal fraud scheme in the history of the Eastern District of California, U.S. Attorney Phillip A. Talbert announced.

July 19, 2023 ¡ª Zhang Li, founder and chief executive officer of a Chinese real estate development company appeared last night in U.S. District Court on charges that he bribed former head of the San Francisco Department of Public Works Mohammed Nuru, announced First Assistant United States Attorney Patrick Robbins, Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation (CI) Special Agent in Charge Darren Lian, and Federal Bureau of Investigation Special Agent in Charge Robert K. Tripp. A U.S. company that Zhang controls, Z&L Properties, Inc., was also charged with honest services wire fraud for providing bribes and gifts to Nuru in exchange for favorable city treatment of Z&L Properties¡¯ mixed-use project at 555 Fulton Street in San Francisco, Calif. As part of a negotiated disposition both Zhang and Z&L Properties will waive the right to indictment and admit that they engaged in certain conduct.

November 17, 2023 ¡ª United States Attorney Jacqueline C. Romero announced that Joseph Cammarata of Monmouth Beach, New Jersey, was found guilty on November 15, 2023, on five counts of tax evasion following a two-week trial in the District of New Jersey before U.S. District Judge Peter G. Sheridan.

April 15, 2024 ¡ª Damian Williams, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York; Thomas Fattorusso, the Special Agent in Charge of the New York Field Office of the Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation (IRS CI); James Smith, the Assistant Director in Charge of the New York Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI); and Trevor R. Nelson, the Deputy Inspector General for Investigations for the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA), announced today the unsealing of an Indictment charging Rafael Alvarez, a/k/a ¡°the Magician,¡± with conspiracy to defraud the United States, aiding and abetting the filing of false federal tax returns, attempting to interfere with the administration of the internal revenue laws, making false statements, and aggravated identity theft.

November 14, 2023 ¡ª Federal and local law enforcement officials this morning announced the unsealing of a federal grand jury indictment charging 23 members and associates of the Mara Salvatrucha-13 (MS-13) transnational street gang who allegedly trafficked pound quantities of methamphetamine and illegally possessed ammunition found in a "ghost gun."

April 4, 2023 ¡ª Former San Diego Police Vice Detective Peter Griffin and three co-defendants pleaded guilty in federal court today in connection with their operation of five illicit massage businesses in California and Arizona that profited for years by exploiting women to engage in commercial sexual services under the guise of offering therapeutic massage services.

SAN FRANCISCO ¨C Kenneth W. Mattson, of Sonoma, was arrested today pursuant to an indictment returned by a federal grand jury charging him with wire fraud, money laundering, and obstruction of justice.