Feb.04, 2010, 2:51 am ICT, Source: BNO News

The U.S. Department of Justice announced on Wednesday that Mehran Koranki has been indicted on charges of mail fraud and money laundering.

Mr. Koranki, a resident of Yukon, Oklahoma, has been charged by a federal grand jury with defrauding Nortel Networks for more than $6.2 million. SMC Electronics and Allied Solution Technical Center (ASTC), both owned by Koranki, used a warranty agreement with Nortel Networks to obtain computer parts valued as high as $24,995 between February 2005 and March 2006.

Nortel Networks’ warranty agreement allows users to obtain replacements for broken or defective parts, not for selling them to third parties but for using in their own Nortel Systems. According to the charges filed, Koranki obtained replacement parts exclusively for selling them to third parties.

Mr. Koranki is also charged with five counts of money laundering due to financial transactions involving criminally derived proceeds.

If he is found guilty of mail fraud he could face up to 22 years for each count, a fine of $250,000 and he would also have to forfeit the whole $6.2 million. For the money laundering charges he could carry a sentence of ten years for each of the five counts.