LOS ANGELES – A now-imprisoned fraudster was sentenced today to 78 months in federal prison for hiring several now-convicted off-duty former Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department (LASD) deputies to violate his perceived adversaries’ civil rights, stealing more than $37 million from Meta Platforms Inc. by fraudulently gaining access to its business manager accounts and their lines of credit, and for cheating on his taxes.
Adam Iza, 26, a.k.a. “The Godfather,” who formerly resided in Beverly Hills and Newport Beach, was sentenced by United States District Judge Percy Anderson, who also ordered him to pay $23,402,766 in restitution.
Iza pleaded guilty in January 2025 to one count of conspiracy against rights, one count of wire fraud, and one count of tax evasion.
He has been in federal custody since September 2024, and today’s sentence runs concurrent to a 15-year federal prison sentence received last month in Connecticut for his involvement in an attempted robbery of Bitcoin the month prior to his arrest.
According to Iza’s plea agreement in his Los Angeles federal criminal case, from August 2021 to April 2022, he hired off-duty LASD deputies to provide him with personal security. Iza knowingly and intentionally conspired with these corrupt sheriff’s deputies to obtain confidential law enforcement information, personally identifiable information (PII) about individuals with whom Iza had financial and other disputes, and court-authorized search warrants to track down and harass his victims. While using the sobriquet “The Godfather,” Iza also enlisted the corrupt deputies to intimidate and threaten these victims.
In total, five now-former LASD deputies whom Iza employed now stand convicted of federal crimes:
- Eric Chase Saavedra, 42, of Chino, a former LASD deputy and a former federal task force officer, was sentenced on September 28 to 21 months in federal prison after pleading guilty in February 2025 to one count of conspiracy against rights and one count of making and subscribing to a false tax return. Saavedra founded a company – Saavedra & Associates LLC – that provided security to Iza and hired LASD deputies to do so. Among other crimes, Saavedra used his powers as a sworn law enforcement officer to improperly obtain court-authorized search warrants related to intimidating, threatening, and harassing Iza’s adversaries.
- Michael David Coberg, 45, of Eastvale, is serving a 63-month federal prison sentence for helping Iza extort a rival and arranging the sham illegal drug possession arrest of another adversary in Paramount in 2021. Judge Anderson sentenced Coberg on March 16.
- Scott Allen Simpkins, 34, of Brea, was sentenced on July 13 to 18 months in federal prison for obstructing a federal investigation into Iza’s extortion of $25,000 from a party planner at Iza’s Bel Air mansion.
- David Anthony Rodriguez, 45, of La Verne, was sentenced on July 20 to one year in federal prison and who had worked for Iza as a private security guard, pleaded guilty to submitting a false search warrant application to a state court judge on behalf of a different client.
“Individuals with substantial financial resources must understand that they cannot
purchase access to confidential databases, investigative tools, warrants, arrests, badges, or firearms for use in private disputes,” prosecutors argued in a sentencing memorandum.
In an unrelated scheme, from December 2020 to September 2024, Iza fraudulently gained access to Meta business manager accounts and their associated lines of credit. He then sold access to the compromised accounts and lines of credit to various advertising companies, making substantial profits in the process.
From 2020 through 2022, Iza received approximately $37 million associated with the sale of access to the Meta advertisement accounts into his companies’ bank accounts from domestic and international payors. As a result, Meta clients were billed for, and paid for, advertising expenditures they did not incur. When Meta or Meta clients discovered the fraudulent billing, Meta refunded its clients, thereby suffering the loss.
Iza admitted in his plea agreement that from 2020 through 2023, he received at least $36,360,844 in gross income from his scheme to defraud Meta, causing a total loss to the IRS of $13,286,152. Iza knowingly failed to file corporate tax returns during this time. He further evaded the payment of federal taxes by concealing his ownership of his company, Zort, including his communications with advertising clients, getting a co-schemer to use the money to acquire personal items for Iza and himself, and by transferring his corporate income to cryptocurrency custodians.
Relatedly, Iris Rabaya Au, 37, of Irvine, was sentenced on September 21 to 18 months in federal prison and was ordered to pay $1,484,343 in restitution and to forfeit a fleet of luxury and high-performance cars, designer handbags, and three “Godfather” sculptures, among other assets.
Au pleaded guilty in March 2025 to one count of subscribing to a false tax return. She failed to report more than $2.6 million in ill-gotten gains she obtained via Iza’s criminal activities.
The FBI and IRS Criminal Investigation investigated this matter. The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department has assisted.
Assistant United States Attorney Maxwell K. Coll of the National Security Division prosecuted this case.
Release No. 26-188
