Baltimore dance artist Chad Focus has been indicted for credit card fraud in the US, with prosecutors saying he charged an insane US $4.1 million (FYI that’s about AUD $7 million) to his day job’s company card in a bid to fund his music career.
As Vulture reports, Focus — whose 2018 single ‘Dance With Me’ charted on the Billboard ‘Dance Club Songs’ chart and even copped a T-Pain remix — is facing charges of conspiracy, wire fraud, and aggravated identity theft that could land him behind bars for the next two decades.
It’s after the professional SEO analyst allegedly teamed up with four other co-workers to rack up millions of dollars in dodgy purchases on the company’s dime, including audio equipment, concert tickets, touring expenses and fake Spotify streams, social-media followers and views to beef up his online following.
A chunk of the cashola was also splashed on giant promotional billboards situated in New York’s Times Square and Washington DC:
https://twitter.com/_alexweinberg/status/1052696820554567685?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
It happened across 2015 – 2018, with the musician allegedly dodging detection for so long by faking credit card statements and forging the signatures of his company’s supervisors.
Focus, real name Chad Arrington, was indicted by a grand jury on May 29 and will now face federal prosecution.
It comes after he made a cameo on 50 Cent’s website series ThisIs50 last year, bragging about having the “cheat code” to help musicians make money off of streaming.
You can watch that interview below.
