2 men to plead guilty in card skimmer plot
Feds: Info used to buy gift cards at Home Depot
Two Cuban men who authorities say installed credit card skimmers on area gas pumps and then used the information to buy numerous gift cards are set to plead guilty in federal court, records show.
In April, according to court documents, after some victims received fraud alerts from their banks and complained to police, a Loveland police officer found credit card skimmers installed on two pumps at a Mobil gas station in the city.
The documents say surveillance video from that Loveland Mobil station showed two men – who investigators identified as Yasmany Ulacia Garcia and Luis Ernesto Vigil Ochoa – “apparently tampering with” two gas pumps at approximately 11 p.m. on April 12, 2022.
Two weeks later, a black Hyundai sedan with Florida license plates pulled up to the pumps, staying for about two minutes.
A U.S. Secret Service agent said in court documents that when people place skimmers on gas pumps, they typically return days or weeks later to wirelessly download credit card data from the skimmers.
On April 27, according to the documents, the same black Hyundai was seen on surveillance video at the Home Depot in Mason, where Garcia and
Ochoa bought gift cards.
Also that day, both men spent “a significant amount of time” at self-checkout machines at several other Home Depot stores, buying gift cards and other merchandise, according to the documents. The Home Depot stores were in Hamilton, Lebanon, West Chester and Milford.
The men also went to a Target store in Mason, the documents say, and to a Home Depot in Cold Spring, Kentucky on April 28.
Garcia, 34, and Ochoa, 29, were considered fugitives for about seven months.
Agents ultimately found them staying at a Dayton hotel, according to court documents.
Investigators searched their hotel room and found a magnetic strip readerwriter and a skimming device, according to the documents.
When the men were arrested outside a Miamisburg Home Depot in December 2022, the men had multiple gift cards – as well as a fraudulent American Express card, the documents say.
In 2019, the men had been ordered to be removed from the U.S. and sent back to Cuba, officials said.
Both men have agreed to plead guilty in federal court in Cincinnati to charges related to using skimming devices, court records say. A hearing date has not been set.