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Sullivan County resident Tetiana Berriors, of the hamlet of Smallwood, was arrested on Thursday, June 8, said Damian Williams, the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York.
According to court documents, Berriors conspired to commit money laundering and bank fraud in connection with laundering the proceeds of a series of business email compromise scams that sought to deceive victims into sending nearly $10 million to bank accounts that she and others opened using fake and stolen identities.
“Tetiana Berriors exploited the United States financial system to launder millions of dollars of fraud proceeds," Williams said. "In doing so, she helped victimize over 15 different individuals, businesses, government entities, and public institutions."
According to the indictment, around December 2020 through at least October 2022, Berriors laundered funds on behalf of individuals engaged in a series of frauds that targeted individuals, public institutions, government entities, and businesses located across the US.
The victims included, among others, a public research university in Pennsylvania, a housing developer in Texas, and a county-level government in California.
To launder the money, Berriors created over a dozen fraudulent bank accounts, used those accounts to receive funds from victims of the frauds, and rapidly depleted those accounts through cash withdrawals, wire transfers, and cashier’s checks, the indictment said.
Typically, the wire transfers and cashier’s checks were made payable to shell companies that Berriors or her co-conspirators controlled. In total, she opened at least 13 fraudulent bank accounts in the name of at least five shell companies using four different female aliases. Three of those aliases were identities stolen from real individuals.
As a result of the fraud, more than 15 victims were directed to transfer nearly $10 million to bank accounts under the control of Berriors and her co-conspirators. Out of those nearly $10 million, Berriors and her co-conspirators successfully stole over $3.5 million in victim funds, the US Attorney said.
If convicted, Berriors faces up to 30 years in prison.
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