Former Jaguars employee used embezzled funds on Tiger Woods putter and so much more, prosecutors say
The saga of the ex-Jacksonville Jaguars employee who pleaded guilty to embezzling $22 million from the team keeps getting wilder.
Last we left Amit Patel, the Jaguars' former financial planning and analysis manager, he had pleaded guilty to federal charges of wire fraud and illegal monetary transaction. The two counts add up to a maximum sentence of 30 years, but the plea deal will likely reduce that sentence. Prosecutors are reportedly recommending eight years.
Two questions that loom over Patel's sentencing is what he did with that money and what can be done to make the Jaguars whole. The Jaguars are certainly interested in those answers, given they recently pleaded with FanDuel to return $20 million.
ESPN reports that Patel's attorney, Alex King, claims his client was pushed into the crime due to a gambling addiction and used "99% of the misappropriated funds" to pay back gambling losses.
However, the prosecution countered in a filing on Thursday that Patel used $5 million on personal expenses, and what expenses they are. Here's the new list of alleged splurges, via ESPN:
$47,113.92 on Tiger Woods' 1996 putter (the year he won his third straight U.S. Amateur and went pro)
more than $278,000 for hotels, rental properties and travel, including $78,800 for private jets
nearly $600,000 at Apple
$40,000 at Amazon and Best Buy combined
$69,025.26 with Ticketmaster, including tickets to Formula 1's Miami Grand Prix and the Pegasus World Cup in 2023
more than $77,000 at the private Ponte Vedra Beach Inn & Club, including a $25,581.30 initiation fee and $5,508.35 for spa treatments
$275,000 to retain King (the best idea of all these)
$140,412.97 on eBay, with purchases including a game-used Trevor Lawrence jersey for $2,200
a combined $9,477.11 with the Jacksonville Jaguars, the Jaguars Pro Shop, the stadium club and the stadium
You can't blame him for having team spirit on those last two. The half-million on Apple also raises questions, as it seems borderline impossible to spend that much on phones and computers unless you're outfitting a small company or running a resale scam.
That's in addition to what Patel was alleged to have spent when he was first charged, which included a condo in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, a Tesla Model 3, a Nissan pickup truck, a designer watch worth over $95,000 and, of course, cryptocurrency and NFTs.
The timing of the Lawrence jersey purchase is especially wild, as Patel is alleged to have won it on Dec. 8, three days after he was charged.
Patel is alleged to have done all this by overseeing the Jaguars' virtual credit card program, which he used to make fraudulent transactions and hide them in the system by duplicating other transactions or outright inventing plausible expenditures.
Patel is scheduled to be sentenced on Tuesday.
