A total of nine people were indicted by a United States grand jury for a million-dollar scam that they carried out thanks to the identity theft of people in Puerto Rico and the use of fake driver’s licenses on the island.
This was reported by the Acting Attorney General of New Jersey, Andrew J. Bruck, who said that the scams were carried out in the states of Pennsylvania, New York, Connecticut and Massachusetts.
Three of the nine defendants reside in New Jersey, while four others reside in Massachusetts, one in Connecticut and one in Ohio.
The nine people are accused of obtaining digital driver’s licenses using stolen identities that, according to New Jersey authorities, were used in a scam to buy and finance more than 1.3 million dollars in vehicles and boats from car dealers in those five states. .
Ricardo Acevedo, 50, of Paterson; Willie Samuel-Baldayaquez, 39, of Newark, and Reyfy González, 33, of Cliffside Park, are charged with conspiracy in the second degree, among other charges, Attorney General Andrew Bruck recently announced. They are all residents of New Jersey.
The Criminal Justice Division’s (DCJ) Office of Specialized Crimes secured a state grand jury indictment on Friday, November 5, charging the nine people with conspiracy in the second degree and other crimes.
The investigators of the case reached the defendants thanks to a complaint filed in September 2020 by one of the victims.
According to the investigation of the case that was presented last week, the gang obtained digital New Jersey driver’s licenses at the offices of the Motor Vehicle Commission of Jersey City and North Bergen, thanks to the use of identities stolen from people in Puerto Rico and fake driver’s licenses from here too.
According to prosecutors, they used other forged documents, such as Social Security cards, debit cards and birth certificates, to carry out the scam.
So far, the number of Puerto Rican victims has not been specified.
The gang operated from at least February 2017 to March 2019. And during that time the group purchased, financed, registered or transferred 26 motor vehicles and three trailers – one motorboat and two personal watercraft – using driver’s licenses. of New Jersey fraudulently obtained thanks to Puerto Rican licenses and the identities and credit of victims in Puerto Rico, according to Attorney General Bruck.
“By diligently investigating New Jersey digital driver license document fraud cases, we frequently uncover larger criminal schemes involving identity theft and financial fraud,” said the attorney general.
The purchases were made at car delears located in Mercer, Middlesex, Somerset, Morris, Union, Essex, Hudson, Bergen and Gloucester counties, as well as Pennsylvania, New York, Connecticut and Massachusetts, according to the indictment.
Of the 26 vehicles purchased fraudulently, ten could be recovered in the United States, but others were sent outside of that country, including seven that were sent to the Dominican Republic.
Eight of the defendants are alleged to have personally obtained New Jersey digital driver’s licenses using identities stolen in Puerto Rico and purchased vehicles and / or boats in New Jersey or other states through fraud.
The ninth defendant, Reyfy González, allegedly conspired in document fraud and received and transferred stolen vehicles and boats.
After purchasing a vehicle on credit, members of the group “laundered” its title, creating a false title indicating that there was no lien or debt on the vehicle they were transferring, prosecutors said.
The fake document was used to obtain a clean title in another state that was used to transfer ownership to another individual, often within the same band, allowing the vehicle to be shipped abroad.
Six of the people are charged with theft by deception for allegedly making fraudulent purchases of vehicles and / or boats in New Jersey.
Acevedo is charged in addition to second-degree counts of using another’s personally identifiable information, identity theft and theft by deception, in addition to seven third-degree counts of tampering with records or public information.
Samuel-Baldayaquez also faces a second-degree charge for using another person’s personally identifiable information and five charges of tampering with third-degree public records.
González is also charged with receiving stolen property in the second degree and two counts of tampering with information or public records in the third degree.
