Ex-Apple Employee Pleads Guilty In $17M Scam: DOJ

CUPERTINO, CA — A former Apple employee pleaded guilty Tuesday in connection with a $17 million scam, the Department of Justice said in a news release.

Dhirendra Prasad, 52 of Mountain House (San Joaquin County), pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit fraud and conspiracy to defraud the United States in connection with multiple schemes defrauding the Cupertino tech behemoth, the DOJ said.

Prasad pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit mail fraud and wire fraud, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison, the DOJ said.

He also pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States, which carries a maximum sentence of five years, the DOJ said.

Prasad remains out of custody pending his sentencing hearing, which is scheduled for March 14, according to the DOJ.

Prasad also agreed to forfeit assets valued at approximately $5 million, the DOJ said.

Prasad, who from 2008 to 2018 was a buyer in Apple’s Global Service Supply Chain, admitted in a written plea to taking kickbacks, inflating invoices, stealing parts, and billing Apple for services never received, the DOJ said.

Prasad admitted these schemes totaling $17 million continued through 2018.

Prasad admitted his co-conspirators in the fraud schemes were Robert Gary Hansen and Don M. Baker, who reside in the Central District of California, according to the DOJ.

Hansen and Baker, who each owned vendor companies that engaged in business with Apple, were charged earlier in separate federal criminal cases, and both have admitted to their involvement in the schemes, the DOJ said.

“In one of several fraud schemes admitted by Prasad, in 2013 he had motherboards shipped from Apple’s inventory to Baker’s company, CTrends,” the DOJ said.

Prasad also admitted to engaging in tax fraud by funneling illicit payments from Hansen directly to Prasad’s creditors.

Prasad also caused a shell company to issue sham invoices to CTrends in order to conceal Baker’s illicit payments to Prasad and to allow Baker to claim hundreds of thousands of dollars of unjustified tax deductions.

These schemes resulted in an IRS loss of more than $1.8 million.

The United States also instituted a civil forfeiture action to forfeit the assets acquired by Prasad with the fraud proceeds, including multiple real properties he purchased and numerous financial accounts containing funds traced to Prasad’s crimes.

“These assets have an aggregate value of approximately $5 million,” the DOJ said.

“Today, Prasad agreed to forfeit all the assets to the United States.”