Kenyan woman accused of stealing Sh72million from US University
A 39-year-old Kenyan woman living in the US is facing charges of stealing more than $700,000 (Sh72.4million) from the University of Connecticut by diverting the money to her bank accounts after posing as a representative of Dell Computers.
According to the arrest warrant application, Ms Muthaini Nzuki, created an account with the vendor company, posing as a Dell employee, and synched up her account and UConn’s account by entering Dell’s federal tax ID and imputing an invoice number and amount owed from any Dell invoice to UConn.
UConn police said they were alerted on June 21 that $773,079.35 (Sh80million) was stolen from the university and they launched an investigation.
COMPUTER CRIME
The investigation revealed that the University of Connecticut’s routing number was used between April 12 and May 19 and that someone who was not authorized diverted the payments.
Between April 12 and May 19, Nzuki is accused of diverting money from an approved Dell banking account to an account she created 32 separate times.
Nzuki used an assumed name of a person who turned out not to be an actual Dell employee and used a free email service in Germany to create the email she used to open the account.
Ms Nzuki has been charged with first-degree larceny and first-degree computer crime and is being held on $1 million (Sh103million) bond, but it was lowered to $500,000 (Sh51.75million) . She is due back in court on December 1.