According to court documents and statements at a sentencing hearing, from April to October 2022, Goodwin and his associates traveled from Georgia to Utah several times to carry out a sophisticated check fraud scheme.

While the associates of Goodwin’s are not identified by federal prosecutors, they also did not say why Goodwin and his associates traveled more than 1,800 miles to scam Utah’s financial institutions.

Prosecutors said Goodwin and his associates stole payroll checks from private mailboxes and recruited local impoverished individuals to cash the checks at credit unions and banks. They also altered the “payable to” names on the checks to match the names and the IDs of the recruited individuals who agreed to cash the checks in exchange for a cut of the stolen cash.

Goodwin and others drove the recruits to the credit unions and banks and equipped them with Bluetooth ear devices to coach them on how to stay calm, where to walk in the branch and what to say to credit union and bank employees. Some of the recruits told investigators they cashed more than a dozen forged payroll checks in one day.

According to court documents, Goodwin was ordered to pay $73,821 in restitution to the $21.3 billion America First Credit Union in Riverdale; $43,343 to the $20.2 billion Mountain America Credit Union in Sandy; $21,125 to the $3.3 billion Goldenwest Credit Union in Washington Terrace; $55,559 to Wells Fargo; $7,880 to Royal Canyon Bank; $6,578 to Central Bank and 5,870 to Zions Bank.