Minnesota Fraudster Sentenced to 51 Months for Embezzling $2.7 Million

MINNEAPOLIS - Destiny McKayla Combs, 37, was sentenced yesterday in U.S. District Court to 51 months imprisonment followed by three years of supervised release for embezzlement, announced Acting U.S. Attorney Joseph H. Thompson. Destiny Combs was the Accounting Manager for a surrogacy agency and affiliated law firm. Combs used her position of trust to embezzle more than $2.7 million from her employer. Combs gambled away most of the $2.7 million she stole.

"Combs treated her workplace like her own personal slot machine," said Acting U.S. Attorney Joseph H. Thompson. "Combs's crime is part of a disturbing wave of fraud sweeping across Minnesota. From private companies to public programs, fraud has seeped into every corner of our state. We will continue to attack this fraud plague with everything we've got at the federal level."

According to court documents, Destiny Combs was the Accounting Manager for a surrogacy agency and affiliated law firm for approximately nine years. In her position, Combs was solely responsible for managing both companies' finances, including taxes and financial statements. Combs was such a trusted member of the management team that, in 2022, the company's owner agreed to sell the surrogacy agency to Combs upon his retirement in 2023. As the sale date approached, however, Combs abruptly quit and moved to Florida.

A subsequent investigation revealed that between February 2019 and June 2023, Combs embezzled approximately $2.72 million from the businesses. Combs's scheme was simple: she used personal credit cards to fund her gambling habit, then used company funds to pay her credit card bills. Combs stole the money to fuel her online gambling addiction. She made fraudulent entries in the companies' books to disguise her credit card payments as business expenses, and exploited the trust and autonomy her company gave her to go undetected. Over 52 months, Combs made approximately 292 payments from the company accounts to her personal American Express credit card, totaling $2,723,025.

While this case was pending and Combs was under the supervision of pretrial services, she repeatedly lied to her probation officer and violated her terms of release. Among other things, without authorization or knowledge of her probation officer, she traveled to New York City, New York; Tucson, Arizona; Miami, Florida; Las Vegas, Nevada; and Seattle, Washington.

Combs was sentenced today before Judge John M. Gerrard in U.S. District Court. In handing down the sentence, Judge Gerrard noted Ms. Combs's bad behavior while on pretrial-release, including her multiple trips to Las Vegas, Nevada, in flagrant violation of the travel restrictions imposed upon her by the Court.

This case is the result of an investigation conducted by the United States Secret Service and the Minnesota Commerce Fraud Bureau.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew C. Murphy prosecuted the case.