BOISE - Terrance Barimah, 28, of Lawrenceville, Georgia, was sentenced yesterday for failure to appear for sentencing and illegal possession of device-making equipment, U.S. Attorney Wendy J. Olson announced. Chief U.S. District Judge B. Lynn Winmill sentenced Barimah to 70 months in prison and three years supervised release. Barimah was indicted by a federal grand jury in Boise on July 15, 2015.
According to the plea agreement, Barimah admitted that on April 23, 2015, he pleaded guilty to the charge of illegal possession of device-making equipment. The plea agreement further described that Barimah admitted obtaining blank stock pre-paid debit cards from his co-defendants, and encoding them with credit card numbers belonging to real individuals who had not authorized the Barimah or his co-defendants to make purchases on the accounts. Barimah provided the debit cards encoded with unauthorized credit card numbers to his co-defendants, and expected to receive cash payment and/or a portion of the proceeds of the fraud.
At the change of plea hearing, Barimah was informed that the sentencing was scheduled for July 8, 2015. On July 8, 2015, Barimah failed to appear for sentencing and the Court issued a warrant for Barimah’s arrest. On February 5, 2016, law enforcement authorities in Atlanta, Georgia, arrested Barimah on the warrant. Barimah admitted that his failure to appear for sentencing was willful.
The case was investigated by the United States Secret Service with assistance from the United States Marshals Service.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the United States Attorneys
