A former executive at a Gwinnett County healthcare company pleaded guilty to sabotaging shipments of crucial medical equipment, the U.S. Department of Justice announced Friday.
Christopher Dobbins, 40, of Duluth, was charged in April with reckless damage to a protected computer after he deleted and modified tens of thousands of shipping records from his former employer's systems, keeping much-needed face masks, gloves and gowns from being delivered.
Fired from his post as vice president of finance at Stradis Healthcare, Dobbins used fake accounts to delay shipments of the personal protective equipment in late March.
“Preventing scarce medical supplies from being delivered to healthcare workers and hospitals that need them is illegal,” U.S. Attorney BJay Pak said in a news release. “Thanks to the cooperation of the victim company and the hard work of our law enforcement partners, we were able to bring this investigation to a swift conclusion and obtain a conviction for this egregious act.”
Dobbins was hired at Stradis in 2016, but conflicts within the company led to him facing discipline in both August and December of 2019.
Prior to December, he had administrator access to the company’s shipping system. That month, he created a fake account to keep his administrator privileges before they were revoked, Pak said. Dobbins was fired March 2.
Just three days after he received his final severance payment, Dobbins used that fake account to delete or modify more than 100,000 records in his former company’s shipping system, the release said.
“Thanks to the quick reaction of the medical packaging company in contacting the FBI, we were able to react quickly and arrest this disgruntled employee,” said Chris Hacker, Special Agent in Charge of FBI Atlanta. “During this worldwide epidemic it is imperative that we make sure crucial medical supplies are not disrupted or diverted from the front lines of medical care.”
Dobbins is scheduled to be sentenced Oct. 16.
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Credit: AJC
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