Former Seattle tech worker sentenced to three years in prison for defrauding employer, government programs, and former significant other

Seattle – A 31-year-old Seattle resident was sentenced today in U.S. District Court in Seattle to three years in prison for two counts of wire fraud and one count of aggravated identity theft related to his three different fraud schemes, announced Acting U.S. Attorney Teal Luthy Miller. Westcott Francis-Curley has been in custody since March 2024, following his indictment in August 2023. At the sentencing hearing, U.S. District Judge Ricardo S. Martinez imposed three years of supervised release and ordered $689,675 in restitution to the three victims.

“Mr. Francis-Curley’s fraud spiral stemmed from greed,” said Acting U.S. Attorney Miller. “After his employer discovered his theft, he stole from a program designed to keep small businesses afloat during the pandemic. And when those proceeds were gone, he committed identity theft against his former romantic partner. This sentence is an important step to break the cycle of fraud.”

According to records filed in the case, the first scheme began in 2019, when Francis-Curley embezzled money from his then-employer by misusing cloud computing resources and accounts available to him as an employee. Francis-Curley used employer funds and his employee work authorizations to purchase cloud computing resources, then sell or lease them back to the company—paying himself with company money—at many times their market value. Through this scheme he obtained more than $550,000, and he was caught while attempting to obtain another half-million dollars. He spent significant portions of the proceeds on extravagances, such as trips on private jets, luxury hotel stays and a penthouse apartment at Seattle’s Harbor Steps complex. Even after Francis-Curley was caught and fired, he emailed customer service and corporate executives in an effort to receive an additional half-million dollars.

In 2020, Francis-Curley defrauded the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), a COVID assistance program designed to help small businesses and their employees weather the pandemic. Francis-Curley filed paperwork claiming that two companies he controlled qualified for assistance, when in fact they had no payroll and did not qualify for relief. He obtained nearly $100,000 and spent much of it on personal goods and services. Program funds were limited, meaning his theft deprived other applicants of the needed assistance.

Finally, in October 2022, Francis-Curley applied for and obtained a credit card in the name of his former significant other. Francis-Curley used the card for more than $1,000 in personal expenditures. The unpaid bill means the damage from the identity theft continues to impact the victim.

In asking the court for the three-year sentence, Assistant United States Attorney David T. Martin wrote of Francis-Curley, “He had a comfortable life and a lucrative job, but that wasn’t enough. Leveraging a bit of Google research and the trust of his employer, Francis-Curley—in his own words—'found a way to make as much money as’ he wanted. Within weeks of commencing the scheme, he was living large: private jets, luxury hotels, cash gifts to friends and family, monthly credit card bills approaching six figures—the list goes on. In two months, he went from paying himself $13,000, to a quarter-million dollars, to—he hoped—a half-million dollars. Only getting caught stopped that unabashed escalation.”

Francis-Curley has agreed to pay restitution to his former employer, to the Small Business Administration, and to the person whose identity he used to obtain the credit card for fraud.

The case was investigated by the FBI.  The case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney David T. Martin.