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Crime The Almighty Buck

MayPayrollHR CEO Arrested, Admits To $70 Million Fraud (krebsonsecurity.com) 37

After absconding with $35 million in payroll and tax deposits from customers, CEO of MyPayrollHR Michael T. Mann was arrested and charged with bank fraud. "On Monday, [Mann] allegedly confessed that the diversion was the last desperate gasp of a financial shell game that earned him $70 million over several years," reports Krebs On Security. From the report: In court filings, FBI investigators said Mann admitted under questioning that in early September -- on the eve of a big payroll day -- he diverted to his own bank account some $35 million in funds sent by his clients to cover their employee payroll deposits and tax withholdings. After that stunt, two different banks that work with Mann's various companies froze those corporate accounts to keep the funds from being moved or withdrawn. That action set off a chain of events that led another financial institution that helps MyPayrollHR process payments to briefly pull almost $26 million out of checking accounts belonging to employees at more than 1,000 companies that use MyPayrollHR.

At the same time, MyPayrollHR sent a message (see screenshot above) to clients saying it was shutting down and that customers should find alternative methods for paying employees and for processing payroll going forward. In the criminal complaint against Mann (PDF), a New York FBI agent said the CEO admitted that starting in 2010 or 2011 he began borrowing large sums of money from banks and financing companies under false pretenses. [...] Court records indicate Mann hasn't yet entered a plea, but that he was ordered to be released today under a $200,000 bond secured by a family home and two vehicles. His passport also was seized.

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MayPayrollHR CEO Arrested, Admits To $70 Million Fraud

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  • by timeOday ( 582209 ) on Friday September 27, 2019 @05:20PM (#59244864)
    Here's a big bag of money for you to hand out. Can you do that for me?

    Ummm.... sure! Thanks!!!

    Bye!!!!

    • via statute. If you want to run a business run a damn business. If you can't get your hands even a little dirty then go away, we don't want or need you.
      • by Anonymous Coward

        Add another CEO to the list of criminals and assholes running the world into the ground...

        People are suffering, people are dying, entire systems are collapsing. I don't want your hope. I want you to panic. Everything is not awesome. We have to acknowledge that older generations have failed. The political movements have failed. The corporate leadership is failing. Society is collapsing.

        When you run off to work for these crooks, it should not fill you with pride; it should fill you with shame.

        Feel the fear I

        • I don't want your hope, I want your panic.

          I think the left wing could use with a bit more fearmongering. The Right Wing is great at it. Uses it to good effect.

          There is a time to be afraid. Fear can be a positive thing when it motivates action to resolve what causes fear.
      • by chrylis ( 262281 )

        Precisely how many businesses have you run where you had to process payroll?

    • If, like the vast majority so small businesses in the US, you use Quickbooks or one of the other big software accounting packages, payroll is built in for a fee. It's very simple to pay people this way. I don't know the point of using a "payroll service" for a company smaller than 50 people.
      • If, like the vast majority so small businesses in the US, you use Quickbooks or one of the other big software accounting packages, payroll is built in for a fee. It's very simple to pay people this way. I don't know the point of using a "payroll service" for a company smaller than 50 people.

        It's the withholding of payroll deductions... many small companies with cash flow problems have fallen into the trap of barely making the net payroll week after week, and then falling impossibly behind on the payroll deductions like FICA, SS, Medicare, 401k, child support, etc.

        It's best for some to have that money taken out of their hands, since misusing payroll deductions is stealing, and going out of business is but a life lesson.

        • by DogDude ( 805747 )
          That's all built into Quickbooks. It's 100% automatic.
          • by Agripa ( 139780 )

            That's all built into Quickbooks. It's 100% automatic.

            That assumes Intuit does not drop your completely legal business because they have decided it is politically incorrect.

      • by deKernel ( 65640 )

        So what you are telling the world is that you don't actually understand what it takes to actually get people paid. Here is a hint, there is FAR more than just doing it in Quickbooks. Here is another hint, it isn't as simple as Quickbooks broadcasting to the Internet "Could someone please send Joe Smith his $xxxx.xx, and I promise to pay you back". Please check back when you get a clue.

        • So what you are telling the world is that you don't actually understand what it takes to actually get people paid. Here is a hint, there is FAR more than just doing it in Quickbooks. Here is another hint, it isn't as simple as Quickbooks broadcasting to the Internet "Could someone please send Joe Smith his $xxxx.xx, and I promise to pay you back". Please check back when you get a clue.

          You're right, payroll is a little more complicated that the OP tried to make it out to be.

          But it's not THAT difficult. There really is no reason for anyone to be outsourcing their payroll to someone else.

          • Comment removed (Score:4, Informative)

            by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Friday September 27, 2019 @07:26PM (#59245286)
            Comment removed based on user account deletion
            • by DogDude ( 805747 )
              Quickbooks and the other accounting packages take care of all of this. It costs a few hundred bucks a year.
          • by guruevi ( 827432 )

            It can be relatively difficult, every time you have someone work in a different state, you have a different set of local, county, state and federal taxes, regulations and deductions. Not deducting the right ones could leave you in loads of trouble. If someone goes out of state to visit a client or goes on vacation and they perform work there, technically they have to file taxes in that locality. A single company could be filing taxes in dozens of states, filing hundreds of city and county taxes and the rule

        • by DogDude ( 805747 )
          No, I know how to pay people, thanks. Been doing it for a few decades. And Quickbooks does it just fine, thanks. It sounds like you don't know what you're talking about.
      • The Quickbooks (Intuit) service IS a "payroll service". They all do the same thing--handle the myriad byzantine regulations imposed by the various state and federal entities that collect payroll taxes. Once you have even a single employee you NEED a payroll service, unless you want to spend your entire workweek dealing with tax forms and remittals to half-a-dozen different agencies. And that's before your employee gets divorced and suddenly you-the-business-owner receive child-support withholding orders and

    • Well he did call the company My-Payroll.
      Right up there with "to serve man" in honest advertising.

  • He needs prison, real prison, for a long time.

  • by OzPeter ( 195038 ) on Friday September 27, 2019 @05:32PM (#59244928)

    TFS says "MyPayroll"
    TFA says "MyPayroll"

    But TFH says "MayPayroll".

    This is getting as bad as the grammatical and spelling mistakes of a Trump tweet.

  • What about the folks that expected a deposit in their bank accounts or a check in the mail? Some people live from pay check to pay check and when one is not forthcoming, especially if some bills are autopay, could be in trouble. Hopefully employers managed to get folks paid on time. Or not?
    • You seem to have missed the prior article about this situation. It was definitely "Or not" in a lot of cases.

    • by sjames ( 1099 )

      Not only did they not get paid on time, they were victimized as well by having their last paycheck yanked back out (even if it left them overdrawn). I would like to know when that crime will be investigated.

  • Earned?!? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by ScienceofSpock ( 637158 ) <.keith.greene. .at. .gmail.com.> on Friday September 27, 2019 @05:47PM (#59245024) Homepage

    On Monday, [Mann] allegedly confessed that the diversion was the last desperate gasp of a financial shell game that earned him $70 million over several years,

    I wish they would stop using the word "earned" in situations like this. Earned implies that real, honest, legitimate work went into it, and it plainly didn't.

  • It's right there in the name, MY Payroll. It was his all along, as advertised.
  • He may spend a couple of years in jail. He'll come out with a few million left after the trials and fines. He'll still have plenty of cash to do nothing the rest of his life and enjoy it.

    --
    He who makes $25,000 annually through passive income is more enviable than he who earns $100,000 annually through a salary. - Mokokoma Mokhonoana

    • we nail them to the wall. Good chance he does 10-20 years. First, he fucked with banks. Second, he ripped off businesses, not consumers.

      Unless he's well connected he's gonna do hard time, which with how horrible our prisons are probably isn't worth it. On the other hand if he is well connected (and given how long he got away with the scam might be) then yeah, he'll be A-OK.

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