Jen Shah arrested: How did the ‘Real Housewives’ star commit wire fraud?
Not everyone can run from the law, especially The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City star Jen Shah and her assistant who were just charged with telemarketing fraud!
The fashion icon Jen Shah isn’t just one of the celebrity housewives from Real Housewives of Salt Lake City, but she’s claimed to be a successful entrepreneur and has created a net worth of approximately $3 million by the end of 2020, according to CheatSheet.
Before she made it big on the hit Bravo reality-TV show, she also became a CEO of three incredible companies: JAX Fashion, Shah Beauty, and The Real Shah Lashes. However, it looks like her fame & fortune is not going to help her out of this predicament. Let’s take a look.
Fraud
Variety reported that Jen Shah has been “indicted and arrested for conspiracy to commit wire fraud in connection with telemarketing, and conspiracy to commit money laundering.”
People reported that the prosecutors have claimed that Shah and her “first assistant” Smith have allegedly been scheming for a long time and it’s been a “coordinated effort to traffic in lists of potential victims”. In fact, their “victims”, labelled as “leads”, were sold to telemarketing companies who would follow up and sell their business services to specific individuals.
After they allegedly targeted and won over these individuals, the prosecutors claimed Shah & Smith “received as profit a share of the fraudulent revenue per the terms of their agreement with those participants.”
According to the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York these charges allegedly began in 2012: “Jennifer Shah, who portrays herself as a wealthy and successful businessperson on ‘reality’ television, and Stuart Smith, who is portrayed as Shah’s ‘first assistant,’ allegedly generated and sold ‘lead lists’ of innocent individuals for other members of their scheme to repeatedly scam.”
“In actual reality and as alleged, the so-called business opportunities pushed on the victims by Shah, Smith, and their co-conspirators were just fraudulent schemes, motivated by greed, to steal victims’ money. Now, these defendants face time in prison for their alleged crimes”, the United States Attorney added.”
Defense
An insider explained to Variety that the Real Housewives star was actually in the middle of filming for the show’s next season in Vail when she told her co stars that she had to leave a vacation due to “an emergency with her husband”. However, as Jen Shah was leaving Vail, she was quickly contacted & arrested by the federal law enforcement on Tuesday.
Though Jen Shah was arrested while filming The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City, it seems her representative has little to say: “At this time, we have no comment.”
What happens next?
According to a tweet by John Fracnhi, the United States Judge has set specific conditions for the reality star and her assistant including: “Commit no federal offence while on release, must appear as required, no travel outside of UT except to appear in court in NY, no international travel, avoid contact with co-defendants, and no engagement in telemarketing.”
If Jen Shah & Stuart Smith are found guilty of these serious fraud charges, they could be sentenced to a maximum of thirty years in prison. However, if they’re found guilty for one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering, another twenty years would be added to their life spent in prison.
The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City is far from over, in fact, this is only the second season alongside her football coach husband and two children. But will Jen Shah’s legal trouble be shown on the reality series? Only time will tell.
—
Do you think Jen Shah’s wealth was all a big scam? Are you excited for the next season of The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City? Let us know in the comments below!
