SANTA MONICA—A former Hollywood digital marketing executive and professional poker player admitted on Tuesday, November 26 to embezzelment from his employer.
Dennis Blieden, 30, is a former executive for StyleHaul Inc. that worked mainly with influencers on Instagram and YouTube. Blieden, originally from Santa Monica, pleaded guilty to federal criminal charges for embezzling more than $22 million from his employer and using the money for personal expenses and gambling. His charges include one count of wire fraud and one count of aggravated identity theft.
Blieden made a plea agreement, per the FBI and United States Department of Justice, which stated that between October 2015 and March 2019, he was the controller and vice president of accounting and finance for StyleHaul. Blieden wired company money to his personal bank account and falsified accounting record entries, in addition to creating fictitious wire transfer letters to make it appear the funds were from Western Union.
He forged signatures of other StyleHaul executives in order to create a fictitious lease in May 2018 for a condominium in Rosarito Beach, Mexico, which he claimed was being rented for business purposes for the company’s clients and employees. Blieden also used money he embezzled to join and win in professional online gambling tournaments. He used embezzled money to write checks to poker players totaling $1,204,000. Another $1,134,956 was used to pay his credit cards.
Blieden was dismissed from StyleHaul in February 2019. According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Central District of California, United States District Judge André Birotte Jr. scheduled a March 20, 2020 sentencing hearing, at which time Blieden will face a statutory maximum sentence of 22 years in federal prison.
