After pleading guilty to several fraud charges Tuesday, Apollo Nida opened up about why he laundered more than $2.3 million in a massive fraud scam.

Phaedra Parks Stands By Husband Amid Legal Woes?

Apparently he felt pressured because of his wife, Phaedra Parks, $600,000 salary from The Real Housewives of Atlanta caused her to be the breadwinner in the family. Despite rumors that Parks was involved in the scheme, Nida maintains that his wife had no clue. In fact, he said he told his wife he was making all of his money from a legal debt recovery business. It doesn't help that when making appearances on The Real Housewives of Atlanta he often claimed to spend thousands of dollars regularly at strip clubs.

While he took the blame, Nida said he thought he was causing damage to businesses and federal institutions, not every day people.

Phaedra Parks Denies Involvement in Fraud

He said, "It's my fault at the end of the day. I got sucked in and engulfed and lost sight of things."

Nida pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit mail, wire, and bank fraud as part of a huge scam. He was accused of stealing more than 50 victims' identities and using a number of them to set up phony businesses, apply for loans and even open bank accounts. He also stole several Delta Airlines' employees social security checks and and filed fraudulent tax returns and acquired bank loans for cars that did not belong to him, TMZ reported Tuesday. All in all, the scheme brought in more than $3 million.

The woman he was working with, Gayla St. Julien (who is known as his "right hand man") was sentenced to five years in prison last month. Nida is scheduled for sentencing on July 8. He is facing up to 30 years in jail.

The Justice Department released a statement:

"This defendant participated in a sweeping fraud scheme that exploited many segments of the financial system, including phony claims submitted to federal and state agencies, loans secured by vehicles, and even basic identity theft associated with stolen checks," said United States Attorney Sally Quillian Yates. "The extensive nature of the fraud is unfortunate and breathtaking. Prosecutions like this case help to highlight the vulnerabilities in the financial system, so that we can prevent future schemes and protect our citizens and government agencies from theft like this."

"Nida and his conspirators were conniving and creative in their scheme to steal victims' identities and defraud them. The United States Secret Service will continue to adapt its investigative methodologies to arrest criminals who use their technological savvy to violate unsuspecting victims such as those in this case," said Reginald G. Moore, Special Agent in Charge of the United States Secret Service, Atlanta Field Office.

"Many everyday citizens, legitimate businesses and taxpayers have been victimized by this complicated and long running fraudulent scheme. After an intensive investigation with the cooperation of federal, state and local law enforcement, we are very pleased to at long last see this criminal brought to justice," said John D. Sours, Administrator, Governor's Office of Consumer Protection."

Read the full statement here and be sure to keep up with Enstars on Nida's legal ordeal.

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