"Real Housewives of Atlanta" star Phaedra Parks is definitely not happy that her husband Apollo Nida has been sentenced to eight years in prison for fraud. Nida is also seen on the reality TV series with his wife.
Nida was arrested back in January for fraud charges to which he pled guilty. The federal prosecutors believe that Nida stole millions of dollars from 50 people in the past four years.
Pleading guilty, Nida will serve five years under parole supervision until he completes eight years in federal prison. U.S. District Court Judge Charles A. Pannell, Jr. gave the sentence Tuesday. As for the restitution to be given to the victims, it will be determined in a court hearing on July 1.
According to CNN, this is not the first prison stint for Nida. He already served five years in federal prison back in 2009 for auto title fraud. That was before he and Parks got married.
How did he steal millions of dollars? He had two fake collection companies, where employers will gather personal data from their supposed clients, and then use the information to steal identities. He was using their identities to get auto loans. It took a year-long investigation to bust his fraudulent ways, headed by the U.S. Secret Service.
Special Agent Reginald Moore of the U.S. Secret Service told CNN after the sentencing, "Today's sentencing exemplifies impartial justice regardless of economic class or perceived celebrity status. Nida's sentence should be an eye-opener for other like-minded criminals who scheme to steal victims' identities, defraud them and ignore the consequences of their actions."
Special Agent Alexandre Herrera shed more light on how Nida accomplished the federal crime in a sworn affidavit: "Nida knowingly and willfully (did) execute and attempt to execute a scheme to defraud federally insured financial institutions by depositing stolen and fraudulently obtained checks and fraudulently obtained auto loan proceeds into bank accounts opened in the stolen identities of real persons, and conspire with others to do so, and knowingly convert to his use and the use of others stolen and fraudulently obtained United States Treasury Checks."
Herrare added that Nida's fake companies signed up with LexisNexis, Mircrobilt and Equifax, which helped him steal personal information. Further, he also stole U.S. Treasury checks, "retirement checks issued to Delta Airlines employees, and checks in the names of real people that were owed unclaimed property from various state and federal government agencies" to be exact.
