Two Plead Guilty To Defrauding Credit Card Processor

Two Arizona men pleaded guilty last week in US District Court in Phoenix in connection with a scheme that defrauded First Data Corp. of $2.3 million between August 1997 and February 2006. Anthony McCutcheon of Gilbert and his brother-in-law Warren Rice Jr. of Tucson each pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud and one count of wire fraud. Colorado-based First Data  is the country’s largest credit card processor. McCutcheon was the director of the corporation’s First Data Resources data center in Chandler and oversaw payment authorization for goods and services provided to the center. Rice represented Andalusia Companies, allegedly a provider of telecommunications and networking hardware but which actually was a dummy company. McCutcheon and Rice worked together to charge First Data Resources for products that were never delivered. Sentencing is scheduled for June 16; each faces a possible maximum sentence of five years on the conspiracy count and 20 years on the wire fraud count. The Arizona Republic has the story here.