United States Department of Defence official, Samuel D. Marcus, 33, of Oreland, Pennsylvania, entered a guilty plea before United States District Judge Joel H. Slomsky on Tuesday to one count of concealment of money laundering.
The defendant was charged by indictment in February for his role as a money mule for a group of Nigeria-based scammers, during which he received, concealed, and laundered millions of dollars in fraud proceeds.
As detailed in court filings and admitted by the defendant, after falling victim to a romance fraud scheme in late 2022 and early 2023, Mr Marcus knowingly served as a money mule for the same group of fraudsters who had initially victimised him.
From approximately July 2023 to December 2025, while employed as a logistics Specialist with the U.S. Department of Defence, Marcus was in direct and regular contact with this group of Nigeria-based fraudsters, who operated under the aliases ‘Rachel Jude’ and ‘Ned McMurray’, among others.
These fraudsters engaged in a variety of wire fraud schemes targeting victims in the United States, including romance fraud, cyber fraud, tax fraud, financing fraud, and business email compromise, through which victims lost millions of dollars.
The fraudsters employed a network of money mules in the United States to launder fraud proceeds and instructed victims to transfer funds to financial accounts opened and operated by various money mules, including Marcus.
At the direction of the fraudsters, Mr Marcus and other money mules conducted a series of rapid financial transactions to convert funds from fraud victims deposited into their accounts into cryptocurrency and move those funds into foreign accounts.
Mr Marcus personally deposited and transferred millions of dollars of fraudulently obtained money into and through his personal and business accounts, while fully aware that ‘Rachel Jude’ and ‘Ned McMurray’ were scammers who carried out sophisticated fraud schemes.
Mr Marcus also affirmatively misled and lied to his financial institutions and law enforcement officers about the laundered funds, including sending fraudulent invoices to make the transactions appear legitimate.
Mr Marcus continued to work as a money mule for the fraudsters after FBI agents informed him that the money passing through his accounts had been stolen from others and that his transfers were consistent with money laundering.
Mr Marcus is scheduled to be sentenced on October 16 and faces a maximum possible term of 20 years in prison, three years of supervised release, and a $250,000 fine.
