Crime Diversity exec scams Facebook, Nike out of millions in elaborate fraud scheme - After being fired by Facebook for stealing $5 million, she was hired by Nike where she stole another $120k

Furlow-Smiles also caused Facebook to onboard several vendors that were owned and operated by friends and associates who paid her kickbacks and she approved fraudulent invoices for these vendors.​

Ari Hoffman
May 16, 2024



A former diversity program manager at Facebook and Nike has been sentenced to more than five years in prison for stealing over $5 million through an elaborate scheme involving fraudulent vendors, fictitious paperwork, and cash kickbacks.

Barbara Furlow-Smiles, 38, of Marietta, Georgia, served as Lead Strategist, Global Head of Employee Resource Groups and Diversity Engagement at Facebook, now known as Meta. From January 2017 to September 2021 she led Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) programs at Facebook and was responsible for developing and executing DEI initiatives, operations, and engagement programs.

According to US Attorney Ryan K. Buchanan, Furlow-Smiles had access to company credit cards and the authority to submit purchase requisitions and approve invoices for authorized vendors of Facebook. She used her position to cheat and defraud the company by causing Facebook to pay numerous individuals for goods and services that were never provided and got kickbacks from those individuals, often in cash.

Furlow-Smiles linked PayPal, Venmo, and Cash App accounts to her Facebook credit cards and used those accounts to pay friends, relatives, and others for goods and services that were never provided. She concealed the bogus charges by submitting fraudulent expense reports, falsely claiming that her associates or their businesses had performed work on programs and events for Facebook when they had not done so.

After these individuals received the payments from Facebook, they returned the majority of the money to Furlow-Smiles, paying the kickbacks in cash and through account transfers to others, including her husband. She also directed them to pay each other and the people she owed money to conceal her involvement.

According to the FBI, Furlow-Smiles also caused Facebook to onboard several vendors that were owned and operated by friends and associates who paid her kickbacks and she approved fraudulent invoices for these vendors. After Facebook paid the invoices, Furlow-Smiles had the vendors return a portion of the money they received to her.

Furlow-Smiles recruited friends, relatives, former interns from a prior job, nannies, babysitters, a hair stylist, and her university tutor to participate in the scheme. Some of the charges Furlow-Smiles caused Facebook to pay included almost $10,000 to an artist for specialty portraits and over $18,000 to a preschool for tuition.

After she was terminated from Facebook, she went to work for Nike from November 2021 to February 2023 as the Senior Director of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion, responsible for supporting DEI initiatives, developing strategies, and hosting DEI events including a Juneteenth event in New York.

Furlow-Smiles enacted the same vendor scheme to defraud Nike by linking her corporate card to her PayPal and Venmo accounts which she used to pay her associates, causing fraudulent charges to her Nike card. According to the Justice Department, Furlow-Smiles stole over $4.9 million from Facebook and over $120,000 from Nike to fund a luxury lifestyle in California, Georgia, and Oregon.

Buchanan said in a statement, “Furlow-Smiles shamelessly violated her position of trust as a DEI executive at Facebook to steal millions from the company utilizing a scheme involving fraudulent vendors, fake invoices, and cash kickbacks. After being terminated from Facebook, she brazenly continued the fraud as a DEI leader at Nike, where she stole another six-figure sum from their diversity program. Her prison sentence reflects the consequences of her decision to orchestrate an intricate scheme to defraud two of her employers for personal profit.”

Keri Farley, Special Agent in Charge of FBI Atlanta added, “As Lead Strategist at Facebook, Furlow-Smiles’ employer put an extreme amount of trust in her, only to have that trust completely violated. After she was fired, she carelessly continued her fraudulent schemes at Nike, thinking she was untouchable. As a result, she not only threw away a lucrative career but will serve time behind bars for her excessive greed.”

Furlow-Smiles was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Steven D. Grimberg to five years and three months in prison followed by three years of supervised release and ordered to pay $4,981,783.58 in restitution to Facebook and $121,054.50 to Nike, for a total of $5,102,838.08. Furlow-Smiles previously pled guilty to wire fraud on December 11, 2023.

Source (Archive)

 

[Toolbox]

It could not be more perfect that she went on to steal from NIKE.
Does she now hold the record for the most a nigger's looted from a shoe brand?

 

[whatever I feel like]

Don't call it a theft, it is the future you chose.

 

[The Last Stand]

Well, like Nike said, she did it. I'm kinda impressed.

 

[Morethanabitfoolish]

Original thread here

https://kiwifarms.st/threads/ex-facebook-diversity-manager-pleads-guilty-to-bilking-4m-from-company-in-kickback-scheme.178102/#post-17345168

 

[Toolbox]

Original thread here

https://kiwifarms.st/threads/ex-facebook-diversity-manager-pleads-guilty-to-bilking-4m-from-company-in-kickback-scheme.178102/#post-17345168

This was just about the Facebook fraud, nothing about Nike was published in it. I think the article was just referencing her admitting to wire fraud, which had happened two days before that article if this one is to be believed. She hadn't been sentenced yet.

 

[The Punished Mitch]

This is far too advanced of a scheme for your average sheboon, no doubt her husbando is white or jewish.

 

[Prune Tracy]

To be fair she could have done more damage to the companies by spending it on DEI training.

 

[Gog & Magog]

This is far too advanced of a scheme for your average sheboon, no doubt her husbando is white or jewish.

Wrong.

 

[everybody in Portugal]

Is 'black person steals shit' even really news? The amounts and the method are unusual, for a Pavement Ape, but the basic concept is nothing we shouldn't expect?

 

[Lone MacReady II]

Wrong.
View attachment 5995265

House-nigger frontman, a jew would never be seen with that sheboon lest he lose his Talmud pass.

To be fair she could have done more damage to the companies by spending it on DIE training.

FIFY.

 

[JosephStalin]

Some years back a woman I went to school with got 66 months in prison for embezzling $4.4 million from the bank where she worked. Guess that's the going rate far as ripping off employers goes.

Wonder if this will be any incentive for companies to look at their DEI shops and shut them down before they find unexplained financial losses. To Facebook and Nike the amounts this woman stole were pocket change, but to small companies such a loss could mean disaster.

 

[Sweeter and Savoury]

The funniest bit is after getting the boot from Meta the she-boon went straight to Nike and was doing the exact same scheme less then a month later.

Someone at Nike is gonna be fired for not doing back checks.

 

[Agamemnon Busmalis]

I wouldn't say it's elaborate, it's very simple but well-designed which is what makes it an effective fraud. Elaborate fraud collapses in on itself because people can't keep the lies straight...she obviously knew what she was doing. Whenever fraud involves collusion it becomes way more difficult to prevent or detect, especially if it's collusion with individuals outside the company.

Maybe it's explained in more detail in the case itself but I don't understand why she had the ability to spend so much on company credit cards and the ability to create purchase orders and approve invoices. He role really isn't one that handles operational tasks.

Someone at Nike is gonna be fired for not doing back checks.

If she wasn't convicted of a crime the first time it happened, they won't find anything. Employers don't discuss anything about former employees beyond confirming dates of employment and salary.

 

[pot of sneed]

You know what? Good for her. Let Nike and Facebook enjoy that sweet, sweet diversity.

 

[BelUwUga]

I wouldn't say it's elaborate, it's very simple but well-designed which is what makes it an effective fraud. Elaborate fraud collapses in on itself because people can't keep the lies straight...she obviously knew what she was doing. Whenever fraud involves collusion it becomes way more difficult to prevent or detect, especially if it's collusion with individuals outside the company.

I think you're being over-generous here. I wouldn't say someone knows what they're doing when they're using the company to pay directly for preschool tuition. There's no context where that is a plausible expense. It's also enough that even if you had a genuine mistake and reimbursed the company, they're auditing everything you've done. Seems like typical midwit embezzlement: it "works" in the beginning because it isn't continuously scrutinized, they get complacent/sloppy, and when someone does look into it they have them dead-to-rights. She even got a mulligan to help FB save face, and she did the exact same thing again.

Some of the charges Furlow-Smiles caused Facebook to pay included almost $10,000 to an artist for specialty portraits and over $18,000 to a preschool for tuition.

 

[Irregardless]

Is 'black person steals shit' even really news? The amounts and the method are unusual, for a Pavement Ape, but the basic concept is nothing we shouldn't expect?

The news is often how incompetent the diversity hire was, along with how long it went on and how many people noticed but refused to say anything out of fear that they'll end up being labeled a racist for casting doubt on some Yacoubian's Magnum Opus that totally isn't just a collection of their favorite shoes.

 

[I've Seen Some More Shit]

You know what? Good for her. Facebook and Nike are the retards who chose to hire her, she just chose to exploit their retardation. I can't get mad at that, I'd do it too if I had the opportunity, and so would most of you.

If you're gonna be one of the unfortunate niggers to realize you are one, you might as well exploit it for some kind of gain.

 

[DiggieSmalls]

$5.1 million restitution? She better get the grift going again or dive into her peers taste of organized retail theft. If your job of telling faggot white people to stop hating niggers allows you to embezzle that much money, I have to wonder what an actual skilled fraudster could bilk. I bet its astronomical.

 

[reptile baht spaniard rid]

How did they catch her? You’d think fucking PayPal and Venmo on a corporate card would be an immediate red flag, but it probably was the accounting nerds pouring over things years later.