Jamaican-American singer Sean Kingston and his mother, Janice Turner, were indicted in Miami federal court on Friday in connection with a $1 million wire fraud scheme. If convicted, both face up to 20 years in prison for each of the six charged counts.
The 34-year-old entertainer, born Kisean Anderson, appeared in court alongside his 61-year-old mother after their arrest in May. They are charged with one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and five counts of wire fraud related to their involvement in a scheme to defraud sellers of high-end specialty vehicles, jewelry, and other goods using fraudulent documents.
The United States Attorney’s Office of the Southern District of Florida stated that the defendants “unjustly enriched themselves by falsely representing that they had executed bank wire or other monetary payment transfers.”
According to the office, the alleged scheme involved making payments through banks that never actually went through, resulting in the accrual of over $1 million in property.
Arrest and lawsuit
Kingston was initially arrested in California on May 24 on theft charges following a SWAT raid of his South Florida mansion. His mother was arrested during the raid of his lavish Fort Lauderdale suburb home, and Kingston was taken into custody a few hours later without incident.
The raids were conducted following a lawsuit filed against Kingston for allegedly not paying for luxury items. Meanwhile, Turner has faced legal issues in the past over false loan applications and bank fraud.
Kingston is best known for his 2007 No. 1 hit song “Beautiful Girls” and collaborations with Justin Bieber. An attorney for the individual suing Kingston over the unpaid items noted that Kingston uses “basically a script, he says that he works with Justin Bieber, and obviously puts on a big show here. This is a rental house; he doesn’t own it, and he lures people using his celebrity into having them release things without him paying for it and then he simply never pays.”
