Pennsylvania Man Sentenced for Stealing More Than $900,000 from Best Buy

ST. PAUL—Earlier today in federal court, a 36-year-old Pennsylvania man was sentenced for stealing more than $900,000 from Richfield-based Best Buy Co. United States District Court Judge Donovan W. Frank sentenced Joseph Anthony Graziola, III, of Lititz, Pennsylvania, to 48 months in federal prison on two counts of mail fraud. In addition, Graziola pleaded guilty to three counts of mail fraud in relation to charges filed in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. Graziola was indicted in the District of Minnesota on November 17, 2009, and pleaded guilty to both the Minnesota and Pennsylvania charges on June 11, 2010.

In his Minnesota plea agreement, Graziola admitted that from December of 2004 through December of 2005, he submitted fraudulent invoices to Best Buy on behalf of his shipping company for shipments of electronic equipment that was never sent. Graziola had Best Buy send the payments for those invoices, amounting to just over $900,000, to a post office box in Glenolden, Pennsylvania.

In the Pennsylvania case, Graziola admitted that from May of 2003 through January of 2006, he fraudulently collected over $120,000 in fees from more than 250 customers of his Web-based business, Bad Credit B Gone (“BCBG”), a purported law firm that supposedly secured deletion of unfavorable items from customers’ credit reports in exchange for fees. In truth, Graziola never employed any attorneys and did not change anyone’s credit reports. In order to secure customers, he published and shipped both promotional materials and customer applications that highlighted the company’s false claims. He charged $500 per individual and $750 per couple for the services he supposedly provided.

The Minnesota case was the result of an investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service.