Sedgwick County to get back most of what it lost to an e-mail phishing scam

More than a year after being victimized by e-mail fraud, Sedgwick County government soon will get a check for nearly $394,000 from its insurance company, officials said Wednesday.

That will bring the total recovery for the county to $466,000 of the $566,000 that was stolen in the phishing scam.

The county had earlier recovered about $72,000 and the $100,000 remainder is the deductible on the insurance, said Commissioner Michael O’Donnell.

“I can speak for the whole county Board of Commissioners in saying this is a huge relief that we’re getting this money,” O’Donnell said. “They pretty much had told us last year to not expect to get much of anything, so it’s great.”

The settlement appears to close the book on the incident, which embarrassed the county and forced officials to pay twice for the same road project.

O’Donnell said the insurer, Lexington Insurance, was able to recover some of the money from a Georgia man who pleaded guilty to the fraud.

“What I understand from the Finance Department is they (Lexington) were able to collect money from that jerk that defrauded us,” O’Donnell said. “It’s been over a year of time and effort. They definitely earned their deductible.”

O’Donnel also hailed county staff for sticking with the case.

“The Finance Department and our Legal Department were the heroes,” he said.

The case goes back to Sept. 23, 2016, when the county received what purported to be an e-mail from Cornejo & Sons construction. The e-mail requested changes to the company’s banking information in the county’s computerized payment system.

Believing the request to be legitimate, the county complied and sent a $566,000 payment to the fraudster’s account instead of Cornejo’s.

The county discovered the scam when the real Cornejo company complained it hadn’t been paid for its work on a road project in the northwest county.

George S. James, 48, of Brookhaven, Ga., was later arrested and pleaded guilty to the scam.

This story was originally published January 24, 2018 at 4:51 PM with the headline "Sedgwick County to get back most of what it lost to an e-mail phishing scam."