The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California said 26-year-old Adam Iza, who referred to himself as “The Godfather,” was sentenced to 78 months in prison and ordered to pay $23.4 million in restitution.
Iza pleaded guilty in January 2025 to conspiracy against rights, wire fraud, and tax evasion. He has been in custody since September 2024. Prosecutors said the 78-month term will run concurrently with the 15-year sentence he received last month in an attempted Bitcoin robbery case, so it will not increase the total time he will serve.
Iza admitted working with off-duty deputies
According to prosecutors, from August 2021 to April 2022, Iza hired off-duty Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department deputies as private security. He admitted conspiring with them to obtain confidential law enforcement records and personal data tied to people with whom he had disputes, secure court-authorized search warrants to track those individuals, and have deputies intimidate and threaten them.
The U.S. Department of Justice said five former deputies have already been convicted for working for Iza. Among them, 42-year-old Eric Chase Saavedra, who set up a security company that supplied the deputies, was sentenced to 21 months. Michael David Coberg, 45, is serving a 63-month sentence for helping extort rivals and arranging a fake narcotics arrest.
In a sentencing memo, prosecutors wrote that wealthy people cannot buy “search warrants, arrests, badges, or guns” for private disputes.
Separate fraud case involved Meta business accounts
In another fraud case, prosecutors said Iza obtained access to Meta business manager accounts and their attached lines of credit starting in December 2020, then resold that access to advertising companies. Meta customers were billed for ads they never bought. After discovering the issue, Meta refunded customers and absorbed the losses itself.