A self-styled cryptocurrency businessman paid a security company about $100,000 a month for round-the-clock protection, and the man who ran that company was a Los Angeles County sheriff’s detective. Eric Chase Saavedra, 42, of Chino, was sentenced on September 28, 2026, to 21 months in federal prison for a conspiracy against rights carried out for that businessman, Adam Iza, and for filing a false tax return that left out about $373,146 in income, according to IRS Criminal Investigation.
U.S. District Judge Percy Anderson also ordered Saavedra to pay $90,984 in restitution, as described in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California. He had pleaded guilty in February 2025 to one count of conspiracy against rights and one count of subscribing to a false tax return.
For taxpayers, the tax half of the case is the part with a number attached. The $373,146 was pay for security work that Saavedra did not put on his 2021 return, and the court ordered $90,984 in restitution. Anyone who earns money outside a W-2, from side jobs, contract security or gig work, is covered by the same reporting rule.
The $90,984 restitution figure is set by the court, but every new IRS Criminal Investigation sentencing puts a different dollar amount on the table.
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What Saavedra did with a badge and a database
Saavedra founded Saavedra & Associates LLC, a private security firm that often employed active sheriff’s deputies. Iza hired it for around-the-clock security at about $100,000 a month, from August 2021 to March 2022 and again from July 2024 until his arrest that September.
Beginning in the fall of 2021, prosecutors say, Saavedra repeatedly used his sheriff’s department credentials to pull personal information from law enforcement databases on people in Iza’s disputes, along with their associates and family members. The release says he knew department rules did not allow it. Iza, Saavedra and others then used what he found to locate, intimidate, harass, threaten and extort those people, and they communicated over Telegram and other encrypted apps to avoid detection.
The warrant obtained under false pretenses
The most serious episode involved a laptop. Iza believed a victim held a laptop containing more than $100 million in cryptocurrency, and he and Saavedra agreed to get a GPS location warrant for the victim’s phone. In January 2022, Saavedra obtained the warrant from a Los Angeles Superior Court judge by falsely stating that the phone belonged to a suspect in a firearms investigation. He tracked the victim and gave Iza the address.
In March 2022, three armed people tried to force their way into the victim’s home to steal the laptop and fled after the victim fired a shot. Iza then sent the victim a video of the attempted robbery. The release says Saavedra also helped carry out a residence search and personally obtained location information on another person.
Four other deputies and a former girlfriend sentenced in the same matter
Saavedra is the fifth former deputy sentenced in the matter, the Justice Department said. Michael David Coberg, 45, of Eastvale received 63 months on March 16. Scott Allen Simpkins, 34, of Brea got 18 months on July 13 for obstructing a federal investigation into Iza’s extortion of $25,000 from a party planner. David Anthony Rodriguez, 45, of La Verne received one year on July 20 for a false search warrant application in a different client’s matter, and Christopher Michael Cadman, 34, of Fullerton got 21 months and $25,000 in restitution on September 14.
The tax side reached beyond deputies. Iris Rabaya Au, 37, Iza’s former girlfriend, was sentenced on September 21 to 18 months and $1,484,343 in restitution for failing to report more than $2.6 million in income. Iza pleaded guilty in January 2025 to conspiracy against rights, wire fraud and tax evasion, and he is also serving a 15-year federal sentence for an August 2024 attempted Bitcoin robbery and kidnapping in Connecticut. The plea-agreement announcement from January 2025 said Saavedra faced up to 13 years in federal prison.
The forfeited designer goods
As part of the plea agreement, Saavedra agreed to forfeit items bought as part of the conspiracy: 32 Louis Vuitton bags, 27 pairs of Gucci shoes, five Louis Vuitton wallets and a money-counting machine. The IRS and the FBI investigated, with help from the sheriff’s department, and Assistant U.S. Attorney Maxwell K. Coll of the National Security Division prosecuted the case.
Reporting income that does not come on a W-2
The IRS lays out the basic rule for self-employed work on its Self-Employed Individuals Tax Center. Sole proprietors and gig workers report profit or loss on Schedule C of Form 1040, and Schedule SE covers the Social Security and Medicare taxes that an employer would otherwise withhold. Because no employer withholds, estimated taxes are generally due quarterly, and Form 1040-ES carries a worksheet to work out whether they apply. The agency says anyone with net earnings from self-employment of $400 or more has to file a return.
What to gather is simple: every invoice, deposit and payment-app record from the year, and the expenses that offset them. Security work billed at about $100,000 a month, as Iza’s was, adds up to figures that a return has to account for.
The criminal case against Saavedra rested on the gap between what he was paid and what he reported. The sentencing announcement from IRS Criminal Investigation puts that gap at about $373,146 for 2021.
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This article was produced with AI assistance and reviewed by The Financial Wire’s editorial team.
Warren Cohen is a finance writer based in Phoenix, Arizona, covering personal finance topics including credit, banking, and beginner investing. He earned his degree in business administration from Arizona State University and began his career working in consumer finance, where he gained direct experience with lending and credit systems. He now writes for personal finance websites and fintech platforms, focusing on clear, practical content that helps readers make informed financial decisions.
