SACRAMENTO, Calif.-A former Verizon Wireless employee has been sentenced to almost six years in prison for stealing access numbers for about $21 million in prepaid minutes and selling them to retailers at a discount.
The Associated Press reported that Timothy Charles Mattos, 34, of Folsom, Calif., received a sentence of 70 months in federal prison and three years of probation after his release; he also was ordered by the district court judge to pay back $21.3 million to Verizon Wireless parent company Verizon Communications Inc.
Mattos pled guilty to two counts of fraud in February, acknowledging that he had gotten unauthorized access to the personal identification numbers, which allow customers to replenish their prepaid accounts, and then sold them, the AP reported.
