DETROIT (WWJ) - A group of alleged criminals have been charged in Detroit after federal agents say they ripped off millions of dollars in a cellphone upgrade fraud scheme over several years and across multiple states.
United States Attorney Dawn N. Ison announced seven people living in or formerly from Wayne County were charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and aggravated identity theft after allegedly committing 26,000 fraudulent transactions, resulting in a loss of more than $28 million dollars.
Ison was joined by Angie M. Salazar, Special Agent in Charge, Department of Homeland Security, Homeland Security Investigations in the announcemnt. The charged are as follows:
• EMMANUEL LUTER, 31, of Atlanta, Georgia (formerly of Southfield, Michigan)
• JOSEPH INGRAM, 31, of Atlanta, Georgia (formerly of Southfield, Michigan)
• DALONTAE DAVIS, 31, of Sachse, Texas (formerly of Southfield, Michigan)
• DONNELL TAYLOR, 30, of Southfield, Michigan
• DOMINIQUE BARNES, 33, of Southfield, Michigan
• DELANO BUSH, 32, of Southfield, Michigan
• JOSHUA MOTLEY, 33, of Detroit, Michigan
According to federal documents, the group, known as the “Clear Gods," started their fraud scheme in 2017 by using personally identifiable information (PII) of other people to acquire significant numbers of Apple-branded phones.
"These devices were then “charged” to the fraudulent customer cellular accounts or otherwise purchased on credit, with defendants typically needing to pay, at most, a small upgrade fee per device," federal documents allege. "The defendants would then reverse or “clear” the upgrades from the service lines, often allowing them to repeat the previous step of the scheme at another Apple store location."
Members of the group then used various methods -- such as stealing RSA tokens and employee IDs -- to break into AT&T’s computer system to create other AT&T accounts, add authorized users and to clear the fraudulent upgrades from service lines, officials said.
Using the stolen tokens and IDs, federal agents accused members of evolving their scheme by impersonating AT&T Retail Sales employees and calling into one an internal AT&T support hotline to open new accounts or make changes to existing ones.
"As the scheme progressed and AT&T restricted employee tokens to allow access exclusively via AT&T equipment (as opposed to remote-access using personal computing equipment), members of the conspiracy took steps to acquire actual AT&T-networked devices," federal agents said in the indictment. "This included social engineering and sleight-of-hand “swapping” of broken or disabled tablets for active tablets from retail sales employees; the outright theft (or collusive acquisition) of retail sales employees’ tablet-computers; and the occasional, strong-armed theft of desktop computer towers from AT&T stores."
Federal documents said the seven group members recruited corrupt AT&T retail store employees to further carry out their scheme.
Ison said the alleged scheme began as early a June 2017 and continued up until September 2019.
"These types of crimes are often mislabeled as victimless, which could not be farther from the truth," Ison said. "Oftentimes victims of fraud are required to spend many years clearing up financial issues and fixing incorrect personal identifying information caused solely by the greed of these criminals."
For more on today's top stories, click on the player below: