Miami man pleads guilty to defrauding U.S. Ex-Im Bank

The Justice Department on Monday said Guillermo A. Sanchez-Badia of Miami pleaded guilty for his role to defraud two commercial lenders and the U.S. Export-Import Bank out of more than $11 million.    The Justice Department on Monday said Guillermo A. Sanchez-Badia of Miami, Fla. pleaded guilty for his role to defraud two commercial lenders and the U.S. Export-Import Bank out of more than $11 million.
   Included in Sanchez’s plea was one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, one count of wire fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering. Sentencing is scheduled from June 3.
   According to admissions made as part of his plea agreement, between 2007 and 2012, Sanchez and his co-conspirators used companies they controlled to create fictitious invoices for sales of merchandise that never took place.
   “These invoices were sold to two Miami-area commercial lenders in a process called ‘factoring,’ which allowed the conspirators to receive cash for approximately 90 percent of the value of the merchandise listed on the fake invoices, according to the plea. Sanchez admitted that, in order to continue the scheme, he and his co-conspirators created additional fictitious invoices, transferred the funds they received through numerous bank accounts under their control and, in a Ponzi-style scheme, used a portion of the new proceeds to pay off prior factored invoices,” the Justice Department explained.
   When the Miami lenders refused to extend further credit, Sanchez and his co-conspirators produced false invoices and shipping documents to obtain a loan guaranteed by the Ex-Im Bank. Rather than buying, selling and shipping U.S.-made goods as required for an Ex-Im Bank guaranteed loan, “Sanchez and his co-conspirators used the loan proceeds to pay off earlier factored invoices, thereby extending the scheme, and kept the balance of the loan proceeds for themselves,” the department added.
   Five others have been convicted for their roles in this scheme, including Isabel C. Sanchez of Miami, the daughter of Sanchez-Badia; Gustavo Giral of Miami; Freddy Moreno-Beltran of Bogota, Colombia; Ricardo Beato of Miami; and Jorge Amad of Miramar, Fla.