A well-organized Queens retail crew ripped off Home Depot outlets in nine states for $2.2 million in merchandise, then sold the goods to \u201cfences\u201d who peddled them on the black market, authorities said.<\/p>\n
The sticky-fingered gang, taken down in a 780-count indictment, ran the scheme for 13 months, and was so well run that they held regular early morning planning meetings before the heists and kept meticulous lists of the items they wanted, the Queens District Attorney\u2019s Office announced Thursday.<\/p>\n
\u201cBy all accounts, this was a full time job for these defendants,\u201d Queens DA Melinda Katz told reporters. \u201cThey took lunch, they took nap breaks, they took shifts. They picked a particular store, took a full inventory of the products. They showed up that day. After the products were stolen, the theft crew needed to get rid of them as a way to feed the theft crews\u2019 salaries.\u201d<\/p>\n
Investigators said a Queens-based retail theft gang stole $2.2 million from Home Depot outlets in nine states. Brigitte Stelzer<\/p>\n
The theft crew allegedly held morning planning meetings and took lunch breaks from their \u201cshifts,\u201d investigators said. Queens DA<\/p>\n
The stolen goods \u2014 everything from air conditioners to hand tools \u2014 were then sold to five intermediaries who resold them on the black market to unsuspecting customers in Queens, Brooklyn or the Bronx. <\/p>\n
\u201cThey stole from New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Delaware and Maryland,\u201d Katz said. \u201cThey stole from Home Depots from across those states.\u00a0They typically parked close to the exit of the store, possibly to allow them to quickly remove their stolen merchandise into the van.\u201d<\/p>\n
In all, 13 members of the crew were named in the indictment, including alleged ringleader Armando Diaz, 52, who ran 5:30 a.m. planning meetings nearly every day in East Elmhurst to plot out the day\u2019s jobs.<\/p>\n
Queens DA Melinda Katz and Gov. Kathy Hochul announced the takedown of the \u201cbrazen\u201d theft crew Thursday. Brigitte Stelzer<\/p>\n
Once the plan was in place, members of the gang would drive a van to the chosen Home Depot outlet, where several would go in looking for the items while Diaz stayed in touch through their earbuds, according to the indictment.<\/p>\n
Crew member Joana Carolina \u201cLa Mona\u201d Fermin, 38, typically remained in the van to scope out the retailer and keep an eye out for police, according to officials.<\/p>\n
They\u2019d end up with hauls of up to $35,000 worth of goods in a single raid, prosecutors said.<\/p>\n
According to prosecutors, the gang pulled off 319 thefts between August 2024 and September, with the DA\u2019s office and state police investigating the operation with help from officials at Home Depot, who provided security footage of the heists.<\/p>\n
Investigators wrapped up the case after executing search warrants in three homes, 14 storage units and eight vehicles, seizing a trove of stolen goods that included lithium-ion batteries, power tools, copper wire, generators, Bluetooth speakers and roof coating. <\/p>\n
Prosecutors said the leader of the ring would coordinate the heists and stay in touch with the crew through earbuds. Queens DA<\/p>\n
The stolen goods were allegedly loaded in a van or an SUV and sold to five fences for resale in the black market. Queens DA<\/p>\n
\u201cIt takes a whole effort,\u201d Gov. Kathy Hochul said of the joint investigation. \u201cBut the bottom line is, there are people spending every waking hour trying to figure out how to rip off other people, and the result is your prices are higher than they ever should have been.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat is a fact, because stores have to figure out a way to absorb these costs, billions of dollars every year lost because of retail theft across our country,\u201d she said. \u201cHere in the state of New York, we take this very seriously. That is why when we started to see an increase in retail theft, we jumped right on this.\u201d<\/p>\n
Diaz, Fermin and 10 other alleged crew members were arraigned on charges including conspiracy, grand larceny and possession of stolen property, are being held without bail pending return court dates next month, while one defendant is being held in an unrelated case and has yet to be arraigned.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A well-organized Queens retail crew ripped off Home Depot outlets in nine states for $2.2 million in merchandise,…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":440870,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5122],"tags":[5229,95025,5371,5248,405,403,5226,5225,5228,5227,4413,34973,8156,67,586,132,5230,68,1154,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-440869","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-grand-larceny","10":"tag-kathy-hochul","11":"tag-metro","12":"tag-new-york","13":"tag-new-york-city","14":"tag-newyork","15":"tag-newyorkcity","16":"tag-ny","17":"tag-nyc","18":"tag-queens","19":"tag-state-police","20":"tag-theft","21":"tag-united-states","22":"tag-united-states-of-america","23":"tag-unitedstates","24":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","25":"tag-us","26":"tag-us-news","27":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115702829243332333","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440869","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=440869"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440869\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/440870"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=440869"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=440869"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=440869"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}