SEATTLE – A 27-year-old Dearborn, Michigan, man was sentenced Dec. 19 in U.S. District Court in Seattle to three years in prison and three years of supervised release for a fraud scheme damaging retailers across the country, First Assistant U.S. Attorney Teal L. Miller said in a press release. Sajed Al-Maarej operated “Simple Refunds” through the messaging service Telegram, where coconspirators were encouraged to purchase items from retailers Al-Maarej claimed he could defraud.

Al-Maarej and his staff of “professional refunders” impersonated the purchaser and lied to the retailer about the status of the item to secure a refund for the purchaser, while permitting the purchaser to keep the ordered item. The scheme caused more than $4 million in losses for retailers and induced young adults nationwide to join a criminal scheme. At sentencing U.S. District Judge Robert S. Lasnik noted that the fraud “was a difficult and expensive proposition” for the victim companies.

“We need to send a message that this behavior is criminal,” Lasnik said.

“This defendant enticed many young and naïve online contacts to his illegal refunding scheme – some perhaps believed Al-Maarej’s spiel that this conduct was not illegal,” Miller said. “They were badly misled. This fraudulent refund scheme hurts retailers and ultimately raises prices for all of us. Al-Maarej got his expensive toys by convincing others to become complicit in his crimes.”

According to records in the case, between September 2020 and December 2022, Al-Maarej represented to prospective purchasers that they could buy high value goods and keep them, while falsely claiming to the merchant company that a refund was due. Purchasers provided Al-Maarej information about their purchase (order number, name, address, value) and for a cut of the refund, Al-Maarej and his coconspirators would seek a refund by making false representations.

For example, Simple Refunds would claim the item had not been delivered; was irretrievably damaged or would have the purchaser mail a box of garbage or junk back to the company – once the package was scanned at the shipping point the refund was often issued before the box arrived back and the fraud was discovered. Al-Maarej recruited “insiders” at UPS and the U.S. Postal Service who would input false scans into the order tracking history to make it appear items had been lost in shipping, stolen from the mail or returned to the company.

The end goal was for the purchaser to keep the product and get their money back. The purchaser then paid Al-Maarej 15-25 percent of the purchase price as his fee.

Al-Maarej engaged in fraudulent refunding activity as well, on his own purchases. That conduct lasted until at least August 2023. In one instance, Al-Maarej obtained a refund for bulky tools, but he returned to the retailer an envelope filled with plastic toy frogs. One retailer identified more than $500,000 in items shipped to Al-Maarej’s home for which Al-Maarej obtained fraudulent refunds. In total, Al-Maarej made (and retailers lost) more than $1.4 million to his personal refunding activities.

The Simple Refunds channel on Telegram amassed a following of more than 1,000 subscribers. Al-Maarej used a second channel to post information on successful refunds. Al Maarej represented to some of those he recruited that the scheme was not illegal. He targeted young men in their teens and twenties and embroiled them in criminal conduct.

The indictment details how two Snohomish County residents ordered thousands of dollars of merchandise and conspired with Al-Maarej to get the payments refunded. Al-Maarej or others at his direction impersonated the buyers, claimed the items had been “delivered not received” and got the purchase price refunded. The customers kept the items.

In May 2022, Al-Maarej deepened his fraud by offering a “mentorship” program where he would teach others to create their own refunding scams – he charged $6,000 for admission to the program. He boasted that students would “learn from the best in the game, from everything fraud related, to legit businesses and cleaning your money.”

Last summer, Al-Maarej pleaded guilty to wire fraud and mail fraud. As part of his sentence Al-Maarej was ordered to pay $4,353,819.

The case is being investigated by the FBI and the United States Postal Inspection Service (USPIS). Amazon, Costco and Microsoft assisted in the investigation. The case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Lauren Watts Staniar.

– United States Attorney’s Office, Western District of Washington. Edited for style.