Former Jacksonville Jaguars Indian American Employee Sentenced to Over Six Years for Embezzling More Than $22 Million

Former Jacksonville Jaguars employee Amit Patel has been sentenced to more than six years for committing wire fraud and engaging in an illegal monetary transaction. The Indian American who pleaded guilty in December, admitted to stealing $22,221,454.40 from the Jaguars over 3½ years as the overseer of the team’s virtual credit card program. Following his term, he’ll be on supervised release for three years and has to pay $21,132,454 in restitution, according to a Department of Justice press release. Patel took more than that from the Jaguars but much earlier had already returned about $1 million while he could get his hands on it.

Patel started working for the Jaguars in 2018 and was the lone administrator for the team’s virtual credit card (VCC) system. According to court documents, he used his position to make hundreds of purchases and transactions with no legitimate business purpose. Then, to hide and continue to operate the scheme, he created accounting files that contained numerous false and fraudulent entries and emailed them to Jaguars’ accounting department. These fraudulent transactions began in September 2019 and continued until he was fired by the Jaguars in February 2023. 

He used the proceeds of this scheme, in whole or part, to place bets with online gambling websites, to purchase a condominium in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, to pay for personal travel for himself and friends, to acquire a new Tesla Model 3 sedan and Nissan pickup truck, to pay a criminal defense law firm, and pay for exclusive memberships. He did not report any of this illicit income on his tax returns.

He transferred approximately $20 million to FanDuel and $1 million to DraftKings and used the rest of the stolen money on various other expenditures, including nearly $600,000 at Apple and more than $40,000 at Amazon and Best Buy combined. He also transferred $5 million from his FanDuel and DraftKings accounts to his PayPal and other personal accounts.

During the hearing, Patel told the court that he stood before them “embarrassed, shamed, and disappointed by my actions.” He told the court he’d been sober for almost a year and was seeking help for his gambling addiction. “I can never truly convey how sorry I am to everyone affected by my actions.”

However, defense attorney Alex King argued his client, 31, was an emotionally scarred gambling addict who came clean about things he had done wrong and needed help managing a diagnosed disorder. “Mr. Patel will need continued intervention and treatment to bring about a permanent improvement in his condition,” King told the judge in his own sentencing memo, noting that the federal Bureau of Prisons doesn’t have a treatment program for gambling addicts.

Meanwhile, Megha Parekh, the Jaguars’ senior vice president and chief legal officer, read a statement on behalf of the team. ”We gave him his dream job. We trusted him. We worked with him. We broke bread with him. We went through a pandemic and the highs and lows of the NFL with him,” Parekh said. “He betrayed us. We take no joy in his punishment. Make no mistake, Amit broke our hearts.” which previously said that Patel had no access to football information and no other team employees were involved in Patel’s activity.

Federal prosecutors had recommended a seven-year sentence for wire fraud and illegal monetary transaction, while Patel’s attorney, Alex King, had asked for punishments ranging from probation to one year in prison in court filings last week.

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ESPN previously reported that Patel was a high-volume, high-stakes daily fantasy sports player known for racking up big losses. Patel was diagnosed with a gambling disorder in March 2023, a month after he was fired by the Jaguars, and has been receiving treatment and participating in Gamblers Anonymous and Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, according to a memo filed by King.

“This case exemplifies the FBI’s relentless effort to protect American companies and their customers,” said Mark Dargis, Acting Special Agent in Charge of the FBI Jacksonville Division. “Amit Patel knowingly and wittingly created a deceptive scheme to fund a lavish lifestyle at his employer’s expense, and today’s sentencing is a warning to other scam artists: the FBI and our partners will continue to aggressively pursue corporate fraud investigations to protect consumers from bearing the costs associated with criminal activity.”

(Top photo, courtesy of First Coast News/Screengrab)