Freight brokerage owner accused of wire fraud, money laundering
A former owner of a freight brokerage company has been charged with five counts of wire fraud and one count of money laundering.
According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Florida, Khayyam Arif Oglu Farajov, 40, faces a maximum penalty of 20 years in federal prison for each count.
The United States plans to force Farajov to forfeit two personal investment accounts, which are alleged to be involved in money laundering.
According to the indictment, Farajov owned and operated a freight brokerage company called Talishco, LLC. In May 2022, Farajov enrolled in the U.S. Postal Service’s Freight Auction program. Through Freight Auction, Farajov bid on and was awarded hundreds of contracts to transport U.S. Mail across the country on behalf of the USPS. For the majority of these contracts, Farajov failed to transport the mail or hire anyone else to do so, making false excuses to the USPS about why his trucks had not arrived on schedule.
Despite failing to deliver the loads, Farajov would then log back into Freight Auction, manually enter bogus delivery information and get paid.
From June 2022 and January 2023, Farajov obtained more than $1 million from the scheme, the indictment said. After he received the money, he allegedly funneled it through a series of bank accounts belonging to shell companies he owned. After reconsolidating the fraud proceeds into two personal investment brokerage accounts, he invested them in the stock market for personal gain.
The case was investigated by the U.S. Postal Service Office of Inspector General.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office noted that an indictment is merely a formal charge that a defendant has committed one or more violations of federal criminal law and that every defendant is presumed innocent until proven guilty. LL