ST. GEORGE — A man in southern Utah is accused of helping to facilitate the theft of tens of thousands of dollars from another man who thought he was working with the Internal Revenue Service.
Abtahi Ishmum, 23, of Cedar City, was charged Monday in 5th District Court with theft by deception, a second-degree felony.
The investigation began on Aug. 8 when a man contacted police saying he was defrauded out of $20,000, according to charging documents. The man said the scheme started when he received an email from what he thought was a computer software security company.
“He called who he thought was the company and spoke with a representative who told him that there was a pending charge from his checking account to a Chinese gambling website,” the charges state.
The victim was then taken to another person “who was pretending to be with the credit union and told him he needed to work with the IRS to safeguard his money. (The victim) then received a letter in the mail titled ‘Cash Safeguard Agreement.’ The letter told (the victim) that he needed to safeguard his funds by working with the IRS,” according to the charges.
The victim then spoke with several people who claimed to be with the IRS.
“During these conversations, he was told to withdraw $20,000 from his checking account and meet with an ‘agent’ who would safeguard his cash. (The vcitim) was directed to go to Del Taco in Washington City with the cash and was told the ‘agent’ would give him the password of ‘coffee’ so (the victim) would know he was the right person to give the cash to,” charging documents state.
After the handoff was made and the man later realized he had been a victim of fraud, police were called. After an investigation, detectives identified the person who was handed the cash at Del Taco as Ishmum, according to the charges. Police believe Ishmum “drove the cash to Las Vegas and provided the money to a third party, receiving $1,000 as payment,” according to the charges.
Court documents do not give any information about the alleged third party.
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