By Bay City News
A Fairfield travel agent has been sentenced to nine years behind bars for defrauding members of the South Asian community in Northern California, state prosecutors said Friday.
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Iqbal Singh Randhawa stole a total of $147,617, according to a complaint by California Attorney General Rob Bonta. Randhawa, a former Fairfield council candidate who goes by Paul, is listed as president of M&K Travel Services Inc. in his LinkedIn profile.
Between 2017 and 2020, more than a dozen victims hired Randhawa to purchase airline tickets, paying him between $1,100 and $12,000 each, prosecutors said. Instead of buying the tickets, Randhawa provided fraudulent itineraries and stole the funds.
Randhawa also committed over $89,000 in credit card fraud, using stolen credit information to buy legitimate airline tickets and selling them to paying customers “to keep his travel agency afloat,” the attorney general’s office said.
After two trials, he was found guilty of 11 felony counts of grand theft by embezzlement and two felony counts of violating the Seller of Travel laws, prosecutors said.
The court also found several aggravating factors, including the vulnerability of the victims, the significant financial losses involved, and the “callous” nature of Randhawa’s conduct, the attorney general’s office said.