Date: 03-31-2016

Case Style: United States of America v. Andre Hugh Saunders

Case Number: 4:15-cr-00240-O

Judge: Reed O'Connor

Court: United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas (Tarrant County)

Plaintiff's Attorney: Mark Nichols

Defendant's Attorney: Erin Leigh Brennan and Peter Michael Fleury - FPD

Description: Fort Worth, TX - Fraudster Sentenced to Federal Prison for Running Lottery/Sweepstakes Scam

Andre Hugh Saunders, 35, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Reed C. O’Connor to 78 months in federal prison and ordered to pay $505,403 in restitution to the victims. This sentence followed his guilty plea in November 2015 to an indictment charging one count of mail fraud stemming from a lottery/sweepstakes scheme targeting elderly victims, .

Saunders, a/k/a David Turner, has been in custody since his arrest in October 2015 in New York on a criminal complaint. He resided in and/or operated the scam out of Jamaica, Florida and New York. Saunders is a citizen of Jamaica and a lawful permanent resident of the U.S.

According to plea documents filed in the case, from approximately November 2012 to July 2015, Saunders defrauded a Fort Worth, Texas, resident by advising him he had won a multimillion-dollar prize in the “Las Vegas, Sidney, Australian Lottery and Sweepstakes,” but that he must pay various administrative fees and taxes prior to collecting the sweepstakes winnings. This Fort Worth resident believed he had won a sweepstakes and began sending money as Saunders directed.

As a result of the fraudulent lottery/sweepstakes scheme, Saunders obtained approximately $505,000 from elderly victims, including more than $300,000 from the Fort Worth victim.

The U.S. Postal Inspection Service and Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) investigated the case.

18 U.S.C. 1341 provides:

"There are two elements in mail fraud: (1) having devised or intending to devise a scheme to defraud (or to perform specified fraudulent acts), and (2) use of the mail for the purpose of executing, or attempting to execute, the scheme (or specified fraudulent acts)." Schmuck v. United States, 489 U.S. 705, 721 n. 10 (1989); see also Pereira v. United States, 347 U.S. 1, 8 (1954) ("The elements of the offense of mail fraud under . . . § 1341 are (1) a scheme to defraud, and (2) the mailing of a letter, etc., for the purpose of executing the scheme."); Laura A. Eilers & Harvey B. Silikovitz, Mail and Wire Fraud, 31 Am. Crim. L. Rev. 703, 704 (1994) (cases cited).

Outcome: Defendant was sentenced to 78 months in prison and ordered to pay $500,000 in restitution.

Plaintiff's Experts:

Defendant's Experts:

Comments: