A crook named “Rambo’’ headed up a widespread credit-card scam that netted enough cash to pay for goodies such as a Maserati, the Queens DA’s Office said Friday.
Ramsey “Rambo’’ Sutton, a 23-year-old member of the Bloods offshoot gang Mac Ballas from Ronkonkoma, was among 11 people indicted in the $200,000 scheme, which involved making fake cards with stolen personal information. The crew then went on “extravagant’’ shopping trips at stores such as Sephora and Best Buy — everywhere from Queens to Brooklyn to Long Island, New Jersey, Connecticut, Virginia and Maryland, according to a joint statement from the DA’s office and the NYPD.
Eight of the scammers were arraigned Thursday on a 139-count indictment that charged them with criminal possession of stolen property, grand larceny, criminal possession of a forged instrument, conspiracy, petit larceny and falsifying business records, the statement said. Of the remaining three, one is in custody out-of-state on a separate criminal matter, and two more are being sought.
Investigators got wind of the scheme — which began in October 2016 and ended this past April — when they eavesdropped on more than nine phones, learning that Sutton and his fellow fraudsters placed stolen credit-card information in blank Visa, MasterCard and American Express cards, including those with chip technology, prosecutors said.
Members of the ring gathered at the Queens home of Jordan Clarke, 26 — a “mill” of sorts where they created the fraudulent cards, prosecutors said. Clarke’s home also served as a gathering point for the shoppers to drop off their pricey merchandise and distribute them among themselves, according to the DA’s office.
During court-authorized search warrants in Brooklyn, Queens and Ronkonkoma, investigators also seized four firearms, ammunition, 81 forged credit cards, 43 oxycodone pills, 25 morphine sulfate pills, credit card faces, an NYPD-issued bullet-resistant vest panel, an expandable baton, a USB drive containing instruction manuals on how to create forged credit cards and forged driver’s licenses, about 150 templates for credit cards, three card reader-writer devices, a credit-card embossing machine and a manual credit-card imprinter, prosecutors said.
A Maserati, Ford Mustang, Jeep, BMW and G35 Infiniti — all used in the operation of the ring — were seized as well, the DA’s office said.
Sutton could face up to 15 years in prison if convicted of the charges. His fellow arrested Mac Ballas members, Alijah “AJ” Moore, 24, of Laurelton, Queens, and Jelani “Bucks” Bailey, 26, of Cambria Heights in Queens, each could face seven years in the slammer, authorities said.
The oldest member of the ring is Andre Pilgrim, 43, of Brooklyn, who was summarily arrested. The youngest is Chelsea Taitt, 19, of South Ozone Park, Queens. She, as well as Cori Parham, 30, of Jamaica, Queens, are still being sought.
“The 11 defendants in this case fraudulently purchased more than $200,000 in electronics and make-up, exploiting others’ credit lines at stores like Best Buy, Target and Sephora,” NYPD Commissioner James O’Neill said in the statement. “Thanks to this long-term investigation, only three charges are real: conspiracy, grand larceny and criminal possession of stolen property. I want to thank District Attorney Brown’s office and the NYPD investigators who worked to bring this indictment.”
“Even after the alleged culprits are prosecuted, the individual victims will still face difficulty in repairing their credit ratings and credit scores,” Queens DA Richard A. Brown said. “The financial repercussions from being a victim of identity theft can last for years. Furthermore, as three members of this alleged credit card ring are purported to be affiliated with the Mac Ballas, a set of the Bloods street gang, this ring allegedly could have been funding the operations of a violent street gang. My office will continue to work with our law enforcement partners to stomp out this kind of illegal activity.”