LOS ANGELES – Two men who formerly owned a T-Mobile retail store in Eagle Rock were arrested this morning on federal charges that allege a scheme to use stolen T-Mobile employee credentials to illegally infiltrate the mobile phone company’s internal computer systems to “unlock” cell phones so they could be used on any carrier’s network. The defendants were arrested pursuant to a 21-count grand jury indictment outlining the scheme that investigators believe earned the two men more than $25 million.

Argishti Khudaverdyan, 41, of Burbank, and Alen Gharehbagloo, 40, of La Cañada Flintridge, are charged with multiple felonies, including conspiracy to commit wire fraud, wire fraud, bank fraud, computer fraud and money laundering. The indictment also seeks the forfeiture of more than $2.25 million seized from several bank accounts and residential properties allegedly purchased with ill-gotten gains.

Khudaverdyan and Gharehbagloo are expected to be arraigned on the indictment this afternoon in United States District Court in downtown Los Angeles.

According to the indictment, for the first six months of 2017, Khudaverdyan and Gharehbagloo were co-owners of Top Tier Solutions, Inc., a T-Mobile premium retail store in the Eagle Rock Plaza in Northeastern Los Angeles. During this time, most cellular phone companies – including T-Mobile – “locked” their customers’ phones so they could be used only on the company’s network until the customers’ phone-purchase and service contracts had been fulfilled. If customers wanted to switch to a different carrier, their phones had to be “unlocked.”

Khudaverdyan and Gharehbagloo allegedly conspired to fraudulently unlock T-Mobile phones, which would allow T-Mobile customers to stop using T-Mobile’s services and thereby deprive T-Mobile of revenue generated from customers’ service contracts and equipment installment plans. The defendants also allegedly conspired to “whitelist” or “clean” phones that had been reported lost or stolen so they could be activated again.

Between August 2014 and January 2019, Khudaverdyan and Gharehbagloo allegedly advertised their unlocking services through brokers, email solicitations and websites such as unlocks247.com. The defendants falsely claimed they provided “official” T-Mobile unlocks.

In order to gain unauthorized access to T-Mobile’s protected internal computers, Khudaverdyan obtained T-Mobile employees’ credentials through various means, including phishing emails that appeared to be legitimate T-Mobile correspondence. The fraudulent emails were used by Khudaverdyan to deceive T-Mobile employees to log in with their employee credentials so that Khudaverdyan could harvest the employees’ information and fraudulently unlock the phones, according to the indictment. Khudaverdyan and Gharehbagloo, assisted by a co-conspirator, allegedly used the Wi-Fi access points inside T-Mobile Stores to log onto the company’s internal network using compromised employee credentials.

Investigators have determined that Khudaverdyan and Gharehbagloo obtained more than $25 million for these illicit activities. They allegedly used these illegal proceeds to pay for, among other things, real properties in Burbank, Northridge and La Cañada Flintridge.

The indictment in this case was returned by a federal grand jury on June 6 and unsealed today.

An indictment contains allegations that a defendant has committed a crime. Every defendant is presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

If Khudaverdyan is convicted of all 17 counts in which he is charged, he would face a statutory maximum of 237 years in federal prison. If convicted of all 15 counts with which he is charged, Gharehbagloo would face a statutory maximum of 235 years in federal prison.

This matter is being investigated by the United States Secret Service Electronic Crimes Task Force (ECTF) in Los Angeles and IRS Criminal Investigation’s Western Area Cyber Crime Unit. The ECTF includes representatives of the Secret Service, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Los Angeles Police Department, the Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office, and the California Highway Patrol.

This case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Jennie L. Wang of the Cyber and Intellectual Property Crimes Section and Special Assistant United States Attorney Ryan Waters of the Asset Forfeiture Section.

Donald Glenn Beasley (“Beasley”), 56, of Key Largo, was sentenced today by U.S. District Court Judge K. Michael Moore to 108 months in prison and 20 years of supervised release for receiving and possessing child pornography in connection with internet downloads Beasley made of child pornography.

Ariana Fajardo Orshan, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida and George Piro, Special Agent in Charge, Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI), Miami Field Office, made the announcement.

Beasley, a former sheriff’s deputy in Colorado Springs, Colorado, had been downloading child pornography on a peer-to-peer network and utilizing a state of the art encryption when he became known to FBI special agents. According to the stipulated facts filed in court, on September 20, 2018, a search warrant was executed at Beasley’s residence located at 95500 Overseas Highway in Key Largo, Florida. Pursuant to the search warrant, law enforcement searched a Starcraft trailer, which records checks revealed was registered to Beasley.

After a search of the Starcraft trailer, law enforcement seized various electronic items, including Beasley’s laptop and 3 external hard drives. The forensic examination of the items revealed multiple videos and numerous images of child pornography, many involving minor children under the age of 12. On February 11, 2019, Beasley pled guilty to the receipt and possession of child pornography.

U.S. Attorney Fajardo Orshan commended the investigatory efforts of the FBI in this matter.  She thanked the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children for their assistance.  This case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Alejandra L. López. 

This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice. Led by U.S. Attorney’s Offices and the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state and local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.projectsafechildhood.gov.

Related court documents and information may be found on the website of the District Court for the Southern District of Florida at www.flsd.uscourts.gov or on https://pacer.flsd.uscourts.gov.

SAVANNAH, GA: A former professional baseball player has been sentenced to nearly five years in federal prison for his role in a drug trafficking network dismantled in Operation Vanilla Gorilla.

Darren J. Driggers, also known as “DJ” and “eBay,” 26, of Bloomingdale, Ga., was sentenced to 57 months in prison by U.S. District Judge R. Stan Baker for Conspiracy to Possess with Intent to Distribute and to Distribute Controlled Substances and for possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, said Bobby L. Christine, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Georgia.

At the completion of his incarceration, Driggers will be on supervised release for three years. There is no parole in the federal system. Because he was on probation when he committed his offense, his federal sentence will be served consecutively to his sentence for violating probation.

In November 2018, a federal grand jury indicted Driggers and 42 other defendants as part of Operation Vanilla Gorilla, an Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces (OCDETF) investigation into a drug trafficking organization associated with the Ghost Face Gangsters, a violent criminal street gang. Of the 43 defendants, 41 have been convicted of federal charges in this multi-district case.

According to information presented in court filings and testimony, Driggers and other conspirators, including associates of the Ghost Face Gangsters, distributed crystal methamphetamine throughout southern Georgia. Driggers, a convicted felon, also possessed and sold stolen firearms to conspirators to assist the drug trafficking organization by promoting a climate of fear. During the investigation, Driggers bragged to federal agents that he was nicknamed “eBay” because he sold stolen goods via social media platforms.

Prior to his criminal activity, Driggers was selected in June 2012 in the 22^nd round of the Major League Baseball draft by the Detroit Tigers. The following year he received a 50-game suspension after failing a drug test, and in January 2014 he was released from the MLB after positive drug screens. Driggers explained to the United States Probation Office that “I decided I liked meth better than baseball.”

“DJ Driggers was a gifted athlete who did what thousands of hard-working athletes can only dream about: He was chosen to play professional sports,” said Bobby L. Christine, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Georgia. “Instead, he fouled out of his once-promising career by abusing illegal drugs, squandering a truly major-league opportunity and will now spend half a decade in prison for gun and drug charges.”

“This is yet another example of the law enforcement community working together to make our streets and communities a safer place to live, said Beau Kolodka, Assistant Special Agent in Charge of the Atlanta Field Division of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF). “Dismantling these violent drug trafficking networks continues to be a priority for ATF and our law enforcement partners.”

“Methamphetamine continues to dominate the country as the most abused illicit drug,” said Jamie Jones, Special Agent in Charge of the Savannah Office of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI). “Driggers is just one of many victims whose lives have been destroyed because of meth. However, Driggers made the decision to become a distributor of this poison, which in turn affected countless others. This was his downfall, as distributors become targets of law enforcement and go to prison or in some cases end up dead in the street. Fortunately for Driggers, he goes to prison and not the graveyard.”

Operation Vanilla Gorilla was investigated under the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces (OCDETF), the premier U.S. Department of Justice program to dismantle multi-jurisdictional drug trafficking organizations. The case was investigated by the ATF, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), the GBI, the Chatham County Narcotics Team (CNT), the Georgia Department of Corrections Intelligence Division, the Savannah Police Department, the Chatham County Sheriff’s Office, the Bryan County Sheriff’s Office, the Richmond Hill Police Department, the Pooler Police Department, the Effingham County Sheriff’s Office and the Bloomingdale Police Department, with assistance from the U.S. Marshals Service.

This case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorneys E. Greg Gilluly Jr. and Frank Pennington.

The Department of Justice today announced the arrest of almost 1,700 suspected online child sex offenders during a two-month, nationwide operation conducted by Internet Crimes Against Children task forces. The task forces identified 308 offenders who either produced child pornography or committed child sexual abuse, and 357 children who suffered recent, ongoing or historical sexual abuse or were exploited in the production of child pornography.

The 61 ICAC task forces, located in all 50 states and comprised of more than 4,500 federal, state, local and tribal law enforcement agencies, led the coordinated operation known as “Broken Heart” during the months of April and May 2019. During the course of the operation, the task forces investigated more than 18,500 complaints of technology-facilitated crimes targeting children and delivered more than 2,150 presentations on internet safety to over 201,000 youth and adults.

“The sexual abuse of children is repugnant, and it victimizes the most innocent and vulnerable of all,” Attorney General William P. Barr said. “We must bring the full force of the law against sexual predators, and with the help of our Internet Crimes Against Children program, we will. Over the span of just two months, our ICAC task forces investigated more than 18,000 complaints of internet-related abuse and helped arrest 1,700 alleged abusers. I would like to thank our Office of Justice Programs, all of the task force members, and especially the state and local partners who helped us achieve these important results. We are committed to bringing the defendants in these cases to justice and protecting every American child.”

The operation targeted suspects who: (1) produce, distribute, receive and possess child pornography; (2) engage in online enticement of children for sexual purposes; (3) engage in the sex trafficking of children; and (4) travel across state lines or to foreign countries and sexually abuse children.

The ICAC Program is funded through the Department’s Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) within the Office of Justice Programs (OJP). In 1998, OJJDP launched the ICAC Task Force Program to help federal, state and local law enforcement agencies enhance their investigative responses to offenders who use the internet, online communication systems or computer technology to exploit children. To date, ICAC task forces have reviewed more than 922,000 complaints of child exploitation, which have resulted in the arrest of more than 95,500 individuals. In addition, since the ICAC program’s inception, more than 708,500 law enforcement officers, prosecutors and other professionals have been trained on techniques to investigate and prosecute ICAC-related cases.

For more information, visit the ICAC Task Force webpage. For state-level Operation Broken Heart results, please contact the appropriate state ICAC task force commander. Contact information for task force commanders is available online.

The Office of Justice Programs, directed by Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Matt M. Dummermuth, provides federal leadership, grants, training, technical assistance, and other resources to improve the nation’s capacity to prevent and reduce crime, assist victims and enhance the rule of law by strengthening the criminal justice system. More information about OJP and its components can be found at www.ojp.gov.