The alleged multimillion-dollar scam took another grave turn when the alleged 24-year-old, the man accused of being at the center of a scheme targeting former NFL players, was found dead on July 31, 2026. Coulibaly’s body was discovered in the swimming pool of a home in Harrison Township, New Jersey, in the Mullica Hill area. Police had gone to the property to conduct a welfare check after a family member expressed concern about his well-being.

ABC reported that no criminal charges had been filed against Mohamed Coulibaly in connection with the alleged scheme by the time of his death. Earlier in 2026, however, two former NFL players had reportedly submitted allegations concerning Coulibaly to the SEC, the FBI’s Philadelphia office, and Pennsylvania banking regulators.

Then, on July 15, 2026, Barron’s published an investigation detailing allegations that Coulibaly and his e-commerce venture, Motion Ventures, had targeted professional athletes with questionable Shopify store investments. 

“The athletes and other investors would buy into these e-commerce shops that seemed to be doing really good business based on the sales logs that they were able to review,” reported Jacob Adelman, with Barron’s magazine.

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Investigators, as per Barron, later discovered that the sales records had been entered manually by someone running the stores. This was done to make athletes believe the businesses were profitable. One of the players who fell prey to the alleged scam was former NFL linebacker Tae Crowder. The ex-New York Giants player opened up about his experience. 

“We were just, every day, talking about different investments and different things we could possibly get into,” Crowder said. “I saw him hanging out with a bunch of different guys that I know, which made me feel comfortable.”

Coulibaly appears to have entered NFL circles through personal connections. He told Barron’s that he met Terrell Edmunds by chance outside an apartment building, and Edmunds later introduced him to Nakobe Dean and other players. That familiarity helped build trust.

“I would log into the store all the time and just see, like, how it would work and what was going on,” Crowder said. “I feel like the more I told him about that, like, as many times I kept logging in, the number started going up.” 

According to the sources, the 29-year-old invested all his savings, approximately $500,000, into one of the fake web stores. Yet, the investment failed to generate any real return.

“I don’t want anybody else to get involved in anything like this, and whoever has got involved, I just want to come together and make it right,” Crowder told ABC.

Philadelphia Eagles stars Nakobe Dean and Jalen Carter, rapper YG, and U.S. men’s national team defender Mark McKenzie were among the individuals identified as clients in a pitch deck reviewed by Barron’s.

However, Coulibaly denied Barron’s allegations that he was connected to any scam. 

“I strongly dispute a number of the factual assertions and characterizations contained in the Barron’s article and any follow-up reporting that relies upon them,” he claimed in an interview with The Post in July. 

As reported by Barron’s, three former NFL players combined to lose more than $1 million in the scheme.

The reports surrounding Coulibaly have once again brought renewed attention to how he built relationships with professional athletes, gained their trust, and eventually introduced them to his e-commerce investment opportunities.

How Mohamed Coulibaly Allegedly Targeted Athletes

The athletes whom Coulibaly targeted, he offered them a chance to own ready-made e-commerce sites. However, he allegedly tricked the athletes into making an investment of at least $50,000. As a return on investment, he promised the athletes of receiving the principal amount invested. But there was a lucrative catch. 

Coulibaly told investors they would receive their principal back after six months, along with 80% of any profits generated by the stores. According to Barron’s, the Shopify dashboards appeared to show growing sales, which helped convince the athletes that their investments were performing well.

However, Barron’s later found that the transactions had been manually entered by someone with access to the stores’ backend, raising questions about whether the apparent sales were genuine.

That trust was also reinforced by the involvement of Steve Keim, the former general manager of the Arizona Cardinals. Coulibaly told Barron’s that Keim served as the chief operating officer of Motion Ventures, while multiple athletes said Keim joined video calls discussing the e-commerce investments. One investor told Barron’s that Keim’s presence made the opportunity seem more credible, asking, “Because why would someone of Steve’s stature get involved with something that wouldn’t be real?” However, the reporting does not establish that Keim knowingly participated in any alleged fraud.

During the investigation, many users were found who never shopped from the aforementioned sites. For example, Dailyprodtrend received a $5,000 order from an alleged Luxembourg customer for 100 desktop humidifiers and 120 USB-powered cup warmers.

When Barron’s traced the customer, he had no clue and claimed to have not made any purchase.

“Who needs 100 humidifiers and 120 cup warmers?” he said.

With further investigation, it was found that between March 2025 and February of this year, only 90 visitors visited the site. However, it showed more than 360 orders, which allegedly were manually entered. 

After Coulibaly’s passing, the focus shifts to what further findings the investigation might produce.