A former manager at Amazon.com who led a brazen phony-invoice scam that cost the company nearly $10 million, has been sentenced to 16 years in federal prison.
Prosecutors say 32-year-old Kayricka Wortham was an operations manager at an Amazon warehouse in Smyrna, Ga., from 2020 until 2022, during which time she created a network of fake vendors in whose name she submitted and approved millions of dollars in bogus invoices. Wortham used the money she stole to buy a fleet of luxury cars and $1 million home, prosecutors said.
Wortham, who also went by Kayricka Dupree and Kayricka Young, pleaded guilty in November 2022, admitting she had submitted $10 million in false invoices for which Amazon paid $9.4 million into accounts she and her co-conspirators controlled. Hudson, 37, who owned a business, Legend Express LLC, that contracted with Amazon to deliver packages to customers, has been charged with conspiracy, wire fraud, and money laundering for her alleged role in the scheme and is awaiting trial.