Caitlin Ochs/Reuters
Charlie Javice, the millennial tech CEO featured in Forbes’s 30 Under 30, was charged on Tuesday after allegedly falsely inflating her startup company’s user base before selling it to JPMorgan Chase for $175 million.
Javice, 31, is charged with one count of conspiracy to commit bank and wire fraud, one count of wire fraud affecting a financial institution, and one count of bank fraud, Manhatten federal prosecutors said Tuesday. The once rising tech star now faces decades in prison.
“As alleged, Javice engaged in a brazen scheme to defraud JPMC in the course of a $175 million acquisition deal. She lied directly to JPMC and fabricated data to support those lies—all in order to make over $45 million from the sale of her company,” U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said in a statement Tuesday. “This arrest should warn entrepreneurs who lie to advance their businesses that their lies will catch up to them, and this Office will hold them accountable for putting their greed above the law.”
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