Federal prosecutors stated that a former food delivery driver admitted guilt to conspiring with accomplices in a scheme to defraud DoorDash of over $2.5 million by inducing the company to reimburse nonexistent deliveries.

Sayee Chaitanya Reddy Devagiri entered a guilty plea on Tuesday in a San Jose federal court to one count of conspiracy to perpetrate wire fraud, according to a statement released by the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

Federal prosecutors stated that Devagiri, 30, of Newport Beach, California, conceded to conspiring with three accomplices throughout 2020 and 2021 to perpetrate a fraud against the San Francisco-based delivery enterprise.

According to prosecutors, Devagiri exploited customer accounts to initiate substantial orders, subsequently leveraging an employee's credentials to infiltrate DoorDash's software. He then illicitly reassigned these orders to driver accounts under his control. Officials stated that Devagiri then fraudulently marked these orders as delivered, despite them not being so, and manipulated DoorDash's systems to disburse payments to these bogus driver accounts for phantom deliveries.

Devagiri allegedly exploited DoorDash's software by altering order statuses from "delivered" back to "in process," then manually reassigning them to driver accounts under his and his accomplices' control, thus initiating a fraudulent cycle, according to prosecutors.

The disgraced ex-employee implicated in the fraud pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud in November 2023, admitting his participation in the elaborate scheme, according to prosecuting attorneys.

Devagiri, the third defendant found culpable in this conspiracy, is facing a potential sentence of twenty years' imprisonment, as well as a fine reaching $250,000; his return to court is slated for September 16th.