Overview
- Griffin pleaded guilty on March 5 and was sentenced Thursday to nine years in federal prison with a court order to pay $307,386 in restitution.
- Prosecutors say the conspiracy ran from 2022 into 2023 and drained about $2.8 million by stealing mailed checks, altering or counterfeiting them, and depositing the fraudulently altered checks into recruited accounts.
- Investigators traced deposits and flipped an accomplice whose text messages and a photo of an ATM deposit receipt with Griffin’s tattooed hand helped identify him, leading to his July 2025 arrest and federal custody by September 2025.
- After deposits, co-conspirators moved cash quickly through ATM withdrawals, Zelle, Cash App, card purchases and a plane ticket, and one documented case in December 2023 involved $84,490 in checks taken from a North Hollywood mail drop.
- The Justice Department says probes of Griffin’s co-conspirators continue, and the case highlights how social media and instant-transfer apps can accelerate check fraud and complicate bank detection and recovery efforts.