Two Atlanta women who engineered one of the brashest insider fraud schemes against Amazon in recent years are now locked up for more than 16 years each after draining nearly $10 million from the company in just six months and then trying to pull off a second scam while free on bond.
Brittany Hudson, 40, was sentenced Wednesday to 16 years and three months in federal prison with no possibility of parole. Her romantic partner, Kayricka Wortham, 35, is already serving a combined 17-year sentence. Both were ordered to repay Amazon $9,469,731.45. The luxury home and fleet of high-end vehicles they bought with the stolen money have been seized.
Hudson owned Legend Express LLC, an independent delivery company that contracted with Amazon to haul packages. Wortham worked as an operations manager at the Amazon warehouse in Smyrna, Georgia, where she had the power to approve new vendors and sign off on invoice payments. From January through June 2022 the couple turned that access into a money pipeline.
They created dozens of fake vendor profiles. Wortham handed the bogus information to unsuspecting subordinates and told them to enter it into Amazon’s system. Once the phantom vendors were approved, Hudson and Wortham submitted more than 1,000 fictitious invoices claiming those vendors had provided goods and services that never existed. Wortham approved the payments. Amazon wired roughly $9.4 million into bank accounts controlled by the pair and their co-conspirators.
The money disappeared fast into a flashy lifestyle. Prosecutors traced the proceeds to a nearly $1 million home in Smyrna — just miles from the warehouse — plus a 2019 Lamborghini Urus, a 2022 Tesla Model X, a 2018 Porsche Panamera, a 2021 Dodge Durango, and a Kawasaki ZX636 motorcycle.
photo credit: U.S. Attorney’s Office
Federal agents shut the scheme down in September 2022 and charged both women. While out on bond in January 2023, they tried to open a hookah lounge franchise in Midtown Atlanta. To seal the deal they emailed fake court documents claiming their Amazon charges had been dismissed. The papers carried the forged signatures of then-Chief U.S. District Judge Timothy C. Batten Sr. and a Cobb County magistrate who was one of the prosecutors on their case. Hudson also sent doctored bank statements showing inflated balances. Their release was immediately revoked.
Wortham pleaded guilty early and was sentenced in June 2023 to 16 years. She later pleaded guilty to the forgery charge and received an extra consecutive year in March 2026, bringing her total to 17 years. She forfeited more than $3 million, the Smyrna house, and the luxury vehicles.
Hudson took the case to trial. On March 13, 2026, a federal jury convicted her on all 30 counts — conspiracy to commit wire fraud, wire fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering, money laundering, and forgery of a federal judge’s signature. U.S. District Judge Michael L. Brown handed down the 16-year, three-month sentence on August 26. The court also entered a $7.86 million forfeiture judgment against her.
U.S. Attorney Theodore S. Hertzberg called the Amazon operation a “massive fraud scheme” carried out “in just a few months” and said Hudson showed “utter contempt for the law” by forging a federal judge’s signature while free on bond. Secret Service Special Agent in Charge Rob Donovan described the greed as “staggering.”
The case was investigated by the U.S. Secret Service and prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia. Both women are now serving lengthy federal sentences. Amazon is owed nearly $9.5 million. The Lamborghini, the Tesla, the Porsche, and the $1 million house are gone.
