Wu-Tang Clan Imposters To Serve Jail Time for Scams
Falsely portraying themselves as affiliates of Roc Nation.
Two Wu-Tang Clan imposters, Walker Washington and Aaron Barnes-Burpo have just been sentenced to prison for conducting fraudulent activities that mostly involved the use of stolen credit cards.
According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Walker Washington, aged 53 from Augusta, Georgia, will be serving 100 months in federal prison after pleading guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud — supervised for three years after his release. He will also be paying roughly $300,000 USD to the 19 businesses he scammed. Barnes-Burpo, 29, from Crestview, Florida, who plead guilty to the same charges has been sentenced to seven years and will also be paying $300,000 USD in damages.
The two convicted felons used stolen credit cards to live extravagantly, booking hotel suites, limousines, caterers and production studios while claiming to be with the Wu-Tang Clan as Roc Nation affiliates.
“These two flim-flam artists and their phony entourage lived large for several weeks by scamming hospitality providers,” said David H. Estes, acting U.S. attorney. “We commend the skeptical hotel clerk who saw through the scam and alerted law enforcement, bringing this scheme to a halt.”
In case you missed it, five suspects arrested in the Lady Gaga dognapping case.
Aaron Barnes-Burpo and Walker Washington have been charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud & aggravated identity theft after posing as rappers with Wu-Tang and Roc Nation. They scammed Atlanta-area hotels out of more than $100K with stolen & fake credit cards pic.twitter.com/AQWqksFuo9
— SOHH (@sohh) February 13, 2020
Reports say 28-year-old Aaron Barnes-Burpo of Crestview and one other man organized a group of men and women who pretended to be with the Roc Nation production company and the hip-hop group Wu-Tang Clan to use fraudulent and stolen credit cards. https://t.co/XJXVWh61OG pic.twitter.com/n9197jmigS
— WEAR ABC 3 (@weartv) February 13, 2020
