Ramon Abbas infamously known by his alias Ray Huspuppi is sentenced to 11 years in a US federal prison and ordered to pay $1.7 million to two individuals he had scammed.

 

On Monday, a Nigerian social media influencer, Ray Hushpuppi who showed off a lavish lifestyle paid for by millions of dollars he stole was sentenced to more than 11 years in federal prison in Los Angeles.

 

A federal judge also sentenced Ramon Abbas, to pay $1.7 million to two individuals he had scammed, the US Department of Justice said in a statement.

 

Abbas was "one of the best people in the world at laundering money." "In the statement, Don Alway, the assistant director in charge of the FBI's Los Angeles office, said.

 

Prosecutors said that Abbas and a Canadian man laundered money from online crimes like bank cyber heists and business email compromise (BEC). In BEC, criminals hack into email accounts, pretend to be someone they're not, and trick victims into wiring money where it doesn't belong.

Prosecutors say that in 2019, he helped North Korean hackers steal about $14.7 million from a bank in Malta and move the money through banks in Romania and Bulgaria.

 

Federal prosecutors say he also helped launder millions of pounds that were stolen from a British company and a professional soccer club in the UK. He also got a New York law firm to send almost $923,000 to a criminal account and admitted in a plea deal that he helped scam a person in Qatar who wanted a $15 million loan to build a school.

 

Abbas was sentenced to 135 months in federal prison and ordered to pay 

$922,857 to the law firm and $809,983 to the victim in Qatar at his sentencing on Monday.

"By his admission, defendant plotted to launder more than $300 million in just 18 months," prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memorandum. However, they said that much of the intended loss " did not ultimately materialize" ".

 

Before Abbas was arrested in 2020 in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, he had more than 2 million Instagram followers under the name "Ray Hushpuppi."

 

His posts on social media showed that he was living a luxurious life, with private jets, expensive cars, and expensive clothes and watches.

In April 2021, Abbas pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to launder money. In one of his Instagram posts, he wrote, "I hope that someday I will be able to get more young people to follow me down this path."

Ghaleb Alaumary, 37 years old and from Mississauga, Ontario, Canada, was also charged. Prosecutors say he pleaded guilty in 2020 to one count of conspiring to launder money. He was given a sentence of almost 12 years in federal prison and told to pay back more than $30 million.

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