DALLAS - Two men who conspired together to use counterfeit credit cards to make hundreds of thousands of dollars of purchases at various Sam’s Club store locations in North Texas and Missouri, have been sentenced, announced John Parker, Acting U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Texas.
Yesterday, Leonel Martiatu, 29, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Barbara M. G. Lynn to serve a total of 72 months in federal prison. Martiatu pleaded guilty in August 2014 to one count of conspiracy to commit access device fraud and one count of aggravated identity theft.
Co-conspirator Alian Gamboa, 20, who pleaded guilty to the same offenses, was sentenced last month by Judge Lynn to serve a total of 60 months in federal prison.
In addition, Judge Lynn ordered that Martiatu and Gamboa pay, jointly and severally, $340,497 in restitution. Both defendants have been in custody since their arrest in March on a related federal criminal complaint. Both have ties to Miami, Florida, according to detention orders entered in the case.
According to plea documents filed, from Jan. 17, 2014, to approximately March 4, 2014, Martiatu and Gamboa conspired together and used counterfeit access devices encoded with credit card numbers - issued to others - to make purchases at Sam’s Club locations in and near Dallas and elsewhere, including Missouri. Together, the two obtained a total of $340,497 of things of value, affected interstate commerce, and acted with the intent to defraud the persons to whom the credit cards were issued.
According to the complaint filed in the case, on March 3, 2014, the defendants were located at a motel on N. Central Expressway in Dallas. The following day, a federal search warrant was executed at their room in the motel, and numerous items purchased from Sam’s Clubs were located.
The U.S. Secret Service investigated. Special Assistant U.S. Attorney Danial Gividen prosecuted.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the United States Attorneys
