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Description: Fort Lauderdale, Florida criminal law lawyer represented Defendant charged with conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud.

Greg Warren Clarke, 30, of Montego Bay conspired to operate a fraudulent lottery scheme. From in or around September 2013, through in or around August 2015, Clarke worked with co-conspirators, including Claude Anthony Shaw, in a scheme to defraud in which victims were called and falsely told that they had won over $1 million dollars in a lottery and needed to pay fees or taxes to claim their winnings. Victims were instructed to send their money through wire transfers or the mail to Shaw and other individuals. As part of the conspiracy, Clarke and Shaw discussed (over the phone and through cell phone text messages) plans to receive victims’ money. At Clarke’s direction, Shaw received money from victims through wire transfers and the mail. Clarke and Shaw discussed arrangements for victims to send money to other individuals with whom Shaw worked. Clarke then instructed Shaw to send the victims’ money to Clarke in Jamaica, usually through wire transfers. Victims who sent money to Clarke and his co-conspirators never received any lottery winnings. Clarke pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud for his role in the scam on Aug. 19.

Shaw previously pleaded guilty to mail fraud in the U.S. District Court in Fort Lauderdale. In June 2017, he was sentenced to three years in prison.

“Today’s sentencing demonstrates the Justice Department’s commitment to combatting foreign-based lottery fraud schemes targeting American consumers,” said Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Brian M. Boynton, head of the Justice Department’s Civil Division. “The perpetrators of these schemes will be prosecuted, regardless of where they live and operate.”

“The Postal Inspection Service will continue to actively investigate fraudulent lottery schemes based in Jamaica directed at fleecing victims in the United States,” said Acting Inspector in Charge Juan A. Vargas of the U.S. Postal Inspection Service Miami Division. “We will not allow the fraudsters responsible for these Jamaican lottery scams to use the U.S. mail to commit their crime.”

The Justice Department’s Office of International Affairs worked with law enforcement partners in Jamaica to secure the arrest and extradition of Clarke.

The U.S. Postal Inspection Service investigated this case.

Senior Trial Attorney Arturo DeCastro of the Civil Division's Consumer Protection Branch prosecuted the case.

The department’s extensive and broad-based efforts to combat elder fraud seek to halt the widespread losses seniors suffer from fraud schemes. The best method for prevention, however, is by sharing information about the various types of elder fraud schemes with relatives, friends, neighbors and other seniors who can use that information to protect themselves.

Title 18 U.S.C. 1349 provides:

Any person who attempts or conspires to commit any offense under this chapter shall be subject to the same penalties as those prescribed for the offense, the commission of which was the object of the attempt or conspiracy.

18 U.S.C. 1341 provides:

Whoever, having devised or intending to devise any scheme or artifice to defraud, or for obtaining money or property by means of false or fraudulent pretenses, representations, or promises, or to sell, dispose of, loan, exchange, alter, give away, distribute, supply, or furnish or procure for unlawful use any counterfeit or spurious coin, obligation, security, or other article, or anything represented to be or intimated or held out to be such counterfeit or spurious article, for the purpose of executing such scheme or artifice or attempting so to do, places in any post office or authorized depository for mail matter, any matter or thing whatever to be sent or delivered by the Postal Service, or deposits or causes to be deposited any matter or thing whatever to be sent or delivered by any private or commercial interstate carrier, or takes or receives therefrom, any such matter or thing, or knowingly causes to be delivered by mail or such carrier according to the direction thereon, or at the place at which it is directed to be delivered by the person to whom it is addressed, any such matter or thing, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both. If the violation occurs in relation to, or involving any benefit authorized, transported, transmitted, transferred, disbursed, or paid in connection with, a presidentially declared major disaster or emergency (as those terms are defined in section 102 of the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act (42 U.S.C. 5122)), or affects a financial institution, such person shall be fined not more than $1,000,000 or imprisoned not more than 30 years, or both.

18 U.S.C. 1343 provides:

Whoever, having devised or intending to devise any scheme or artifice to defraud, or for obtain- ing money or property by means of false or fraudulent pretenses, representations, or prom- ises, transmits or causes to be transmitted by means of wire, radio, or television communica- tion in interstate or foreign commerce, any writings, signs, signals, pictures, or sounds for the purpose of executing such scheme or arti- fice, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both. If the violation occurs in relation to, or involving any benefit authorized, transported, transmitted, trans- ferred, disbursed, or paid in connection with, a presidentially declared major disaster or emer- gency (as those terms are defined in section 102 of the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act (42 U.S.C. 5122)), or affects a financial institution, such person shall be fined not more than $1,000,000 or imprisoned not more than 30 years, or both.

Outcome: Defendant was sentenced to 36 months, followed by 3 years' of supervised release.

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