POLK COUNTY, Fla. —Eight suspects have been arrested here by the Polk County Sheriff’s Office in connection with a fraud investigation that targeted senior citizens in which there has been a recovery of a total of $8.8 million in stolen funds.
During a press conference, Sheriff Grady Judd stated that the fraud case affected 235 victims across several states, according to WFTS. PCSO worked with the Florida Attorney General and agencies from other states to uncover the funds.
Elderly Targets
“Officials said the victims were mainly targeted because they were elderly. The suspects allegedly transferred money into accounts that the suspects opened and disbursed the money among themselves or made purchases,” WFTS reported.
The suspects, Barbara Frazee, 65, Camala Shafer, 57, and Antonio Penn, 32, all worked at a bank in Maryland. The suspect Okeroghene Akushe, 29, lived in Missouri and Hassan Phillips, 23, lived in Maryland. Kevin Clayton, 25, Roshado Durrant, 26, and Michael Nevarez, 27, lived in Lakeland, according to police.
Sheriff Judd said the investigation began in April 2023 when Synchrony Bank noticed suspicious activity tied to a new account belonging to Nevarez, WFTS said. The account had received a $250,000 transfer from another bank, and the funds were quickly dispersed into other accounts.
Detectives Discover Source
“Detectives found the source of the stolen account information came from three bank employees in Maryland,” according to the sheriff’s office. “Frazee and Shafer were veteran employees with over 35 years of experience and full access to customer data.” According to PCSO, Penn, who worked at the same branch, would ask Frazee and Shafer to log in to their accounts, and he would take photos of the account details and login credentials, WFTS said, Penn would then sell this information on the mobile messaging app Telegram.
Authorities further said Penn met Akushe when they played football together at West Virginia University. Between Feb. 2022 and June 2023, Penn brokered stolen account information to Akushe, who then sold the information to others. PCSO said Durrant told detectives he met Akushe on Telegram and admitted to being a “recruiter” in the scheme for two years.
Account Info is Bought
According to PCSO, Durrant would receive stolen bank files and then forward them to fraudsters who paid for the account information. Durrant communicated with other suspects in the app, including Phillips and Clayton, and had images of between 10 and 20 victims’ banking credentials stored on his phone.
In total, detectives said they documented $8,842,398 in unlawfully accessed funds during their investigation.
