A Brookline woman who worked at a senior level at a pharmaceutical company pleaded guilty to engaging in a scheme to defraud that company of $2.3 million, Acting United States Attorney Joshua Levy’s office announced Thursday.
Priya Bhambi, 40, of Brookline, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and three counts of wire fraud, Levy’s office said in a statement. Bhambi worked as senior level employee in the technology operations group of Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited.
She and an alleged co-conspirator, who did not work at the company, were charged in an indictment filed on March 23, 2023.
Between January and October 2022, Bhambi and her alleged co-conspirator orchestrated and executed to defraud the company in payments for purported consulting services by submitting fabricated invoices on behalf of a sham consulting company, Levy’s office said.
One month after the scheme began, they incorporated Evoluzione Consulting LLC and Bhambi later created a website for Evoluzione with fake information, including fabricated blog posts, so that it looked like Evoluzione was a legitimate consulting business.
They then gave Takeda a statement of work and had Takeda sign a master services agreement with Evoluzione and issue a purchase order to Evoluzione for consulting services with a total cost of $3.5 million, Levy’s office said. Between March and May 2022, Bhambi and the co-conspirator fabricated and submitted five separate invoices to Takeda for services that Evoluzione had not performed, each in the amount of $460,000.
Takeda employees asked Bhambi and the co-conspirator about this, but they made false representations regarding Evoluzione’s services, Levy’s office said. Takeda paid all of those invoices to business accounts, opened by Bhambi’s co-conspirator, in Evoluzione’s name.
The $2.3 million was used to buy a Mercedes-Benz Model E, purchase a diamond engagement ring, make a down payment on a $1.9 million condominium in Boston’s Seaport neighborhood; and place a deposit on a wedding venue, Levy’s office said.
Seizure warrants were issued for the Mercedes, over $1 million in fraud proceeds from the accounts that Bhambi and the co-conspirator controlled, $49,985 from the wedding venue deposit and issued a restraining order to preserve the Seaport condominium for forfeiture.
The charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and wire fraud carry a sentence of no greater than 20 years in prison, up to three years of supervised release and a fine of up to $250,000 or twice the gross gain or loss from the offense.
