Influencer Jailed for $1.1 Million School Funding Scam in Qatar

Influencer Hushpuppi, who stole more than $1.1 million by pretending to fund a school in Qatar, has been sentenced to more than 11 years in prison in the US, according to a report from the BBC on Tuesday.

Ramon Abbas, the Instagram celebrity whose actual name is, will spend his 135-month jail term at a federal facility. According to the BBC, a judge in Los Angeles also mandated that he give $1,732,841 in compensation to two fraud victims.

Abbas was charged in 2021 with complex fraud and entered a guilty plea to money laundering the following year.

According to a 2021 press release from the US Attorney's Office for the Central District of California, the 37-year-old was charged with conspiring to conduct a wire scam, conspiring to participate in money laundering, and conspiring to commit felony identity theft, along with five other people.

“The defendants allegedly faked the financing of a Qatari school by playing the roles of bank officials and creating a bogus website in a scheme that also bribed a foreign official to keep the elaborate pretense going after the victim was tipped off,” said Acting United States Attorney Tracy L. Wilkison in 2021.

“Mr Abbas, who played a significant role in the scheme, funded his luxurious lifestyle by laundering illicit proceeds generated by con artists who use increasingly sophisticated means,” court documents unsealed in 2021 said.

Abbas acknowledged to many other cyber and corporate email breach schemes that cumulatively generated more than $24 million in damages in addition to the school finance scam, the US justice department claimed, according to a BBC story.

“Ramon Abbas... targeted both American and international victims, becoming one of the most prolific money launderers in the world,” said Don Alway, the assistant director in charge of the FBI's Los Angeles Field Office, in a court document on Monday.

One of Abbas' fraud attempts in 2019 caused turmoil in Europe's Malta when payment systems crashed after Abbas attempted to launder $13 million ($13 million) that had been stolen by a group of North Korean hackers from the Maltese Bank of Valletta in 2019, according to the BBC.