Two Bulgarians jailed in US for eBay money-laundering scheme

Two Bulgarians, Ivaylo Vasilev Pletnyov, 39,and Nikolay Georgiev Minchev, 45, has been arrested for their roles in an online money-laundering scheme.

  Thus, about $1.2 million from U.S. residents was collected and sent to a criminal group in Eastern Europe, according to the U.S. Department of Justice said. Two fraudsters used eBay and other Web sites to advertise expensive vehicles and boats they did not own. The two defendants and co-conspirators ran the scheme from about July 2005 to May 2006.

 The money-laundering scheme as working as following: when victims expressed interest in the vehicles or boats, they were contacted directly by an e-mail from a purported seller. Thereafter, the victims were then instructed to wire transfer payments through eBay Secure Traders, supposedly a escrow account service, an entity with no affiliation to eBay. Instead of that users’ funds were wired directly into bank accounts in Hungary, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Greece.

 The two were originally charged on January 9, 2008, along with four co-conspirators.

 Pletnyov, pleaded guilty on January 15, was sentenced to jail Wednesday in US District Court for the District of Columbia to four years in prison for conspiracy to commit money laundering. Besides he was also ordered to pay $306,502 in restitution.

 Minchevwas, pleaded guilty on September, 21, 2008, was sentenced Wednesday to 30 months in prison for conspiracy to commit wire fraud, and was also ordered to pay $270,444 in restitution.

 The Department of Justice continues woringk with foreign counterparts in Romania and Poland regarding the remaining defendants.