Vape Shop Investors Scammed By Wayne Man’s Phony Documents, Officials Say

WAYNE, NJ — A Wayne man has been charged with using phony Food and Drug Administration (FDA) documents, defrauding investors of a vaping company, the U.S. District Attorney’s Office said.

Mohammad Abuhadba, 42, is charged with two counts of wire fraud and three counts of use of a counterfeit seal of a federal agency.

According to court documents, in 2024, Abuhadba had convinced two people to invest in a company that sold tobacco products, including e-cigarette and vaping products.

Investigators said that Abuhadba had never filed the legal paperwork with the FDA required to launch the company, and lied to the two investors, saying he did.

After sending a fake screenshot of a bank account containing $2.7 million, Abuhadba asked the investors to send several thousand dollars in reimbursement funds for business expenses, to which they obliged, court documents say.

Abuhadba took the con a step further by creating his own fake FDA authorization documents using counterfeit agency seals, which, when presented to the investors, prompted them to give him more money, officials said.

According to court documents, one of the investors expressed concern over the FDA applications, to which Abuhadba responded that he has “people who are interested in putting up the funds to do it.”

The 42-year-old also created a fake letter from the FDA, assuring that their application was legitimate, to keep the charade going, officials added.

Abuhadba now faces up to 55 years in prison and several hundred thousand dollars in fines. He has since been released from custody following a $100,000 unsecured bond.