An Orlando-based trucking and freight brokerage company owner has pleaded guilty to wire fraud and money laundering after fraudulently collecting more than $1 million from the United States Postal Service (USPS) for transportation services that were never performed. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, 40-year-old Khayyam Arif Oglu Farajov, who operated Talishco LLC in Florida, used the USPS Freight Auction program to secure hundreds of mail transportation contracts between June 2022 and January 2023.
The scheme began after Talishco joined the USPS Freight Auction program in May 2022. Farajov successfully bid on transportation contracts but repeatedly failed to dispatch trucks to complete the assigned routes. When USPS employees questioned the missing trucks, he reportedly provided false explanations, including claims that drivers were delayed or unreachable. The contracted work was subsequently reassigned to other carriers. Despite not performing the transportation services, Farajov returned to the Freight Auction platform and falsely marked shipments as delivered, triggering payments for loads that had never been transported by his company.
Federal prosecutors said the fraudulent payments were transferred through bank accounts belonging to shell companies before being consolidated into two personal investment brokerage accounts. Authorities seized those accounts, and Farajov agreed to forfeit the funds and pay an additional $993,979 in restitution to USPS. He faces a maximum statutory penalty of 20 years in federal prison on each of the two counts, with sentencing yet to be scheduled. The case highlights how fraudulent shipment status updates can affect freight payment processes when delivery records do not correspond to completed transportation services. For more coverage of freight operations and logistics technology, explore FreightGraph.