International grifter gets 5 years in prison for Denver credit card cloning scam – The Denver Post

A 27-year-old Romanian with a crime record trailing through Europe and the Middle East was sentenced to five years in prison Wednesday for his role in a credit card cloning scam in Denver.

A jury convicted Laurentiu Urziceanu on Jan. 19 of 22 felony counts including possession of a fraud device, bank fraud and aggravated identity theft. He was acquitted of one count of bulk cash smuggling.

Urziceanu and an accomplice cloned credit cards of customers at two Denver banks using sophisticated electronic devices, cameras and computers, said Tim Neff, a prosecutor inthe U.S. Attorneys Office in Denver.

Initially afraid that he would be returned to Romania upon his arrest in Chicago, Urziceanu sought political asylum by claiming that he was a gypsy who was the target of persecution in his homeland. His temporary stay in the U.S. will be behind bars.

Urziceanus arrest happened because of an observant Denver Greyhound bus teller, Neff said at Urziceanus sentencing hearing in U.S. District Court in Denver. The teller apparently believed Urziceanu might be a terrorist.

On Jan. 25, 2016, when Urziceanu tried to send fraud devices in a package through Greyhound, the teller noticed he seemed unusually hurried and his claim that the package contained a toy and sweaters was dubious. A bomb squad was calledand when they examined the contents of the box, they discovered seven pin-hole cameras and credit card skimming devices that wereplaced inside ATMs to steal credit card numbers.

Special Agent David Lauber of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security resealed the package and sent it to Chicago. When Urziceanu, using the alias Brazovics Balazs Peter, of Italy, retrieved the package, federal agents arrested him following a chase through the crowded streets of downtown Chicago, Neff said. At the time, had a forged Hungarian drivers license in his possession.

The tiny pin cameras were used to record bank pin numbers from more than 100 bank customers.

Urziceanu and his accomplice had allegedly stolen credit card information from 19 Wells Fargo Bank customers, court records indicate. They cloned credit cards and used them to withdraw $6,600 from bank accounts. The pair was in Denver only three days before going to Chicago, Neff said.

At one point, Urziceanu went to a Boulder post office on Jan. 25, 2016, and mailed a box of money to his girlfriends mother, Domnica Iovan, in Chieti, Italy.

While in Chicago, he had sent another box containing $22,000 in cash hidden in a speaker box to a family member named Ionescu Ecaterina in Rome, Italy.

Urziceanu entered the country on foot illegally near Rio Grande City, Texas, on Jan. 7, 2015, court records indicate. Neff said the international griftercame to America with larceny in his heart. Urziceanu was arrested in Texas on an immigration hold, but paid a $15,000 bond and fled the state, court records say.

The Rome Crime Squad arrested Urziceanu on April 28, 2011, outside the S. Paolo IMI Bank in Rome after he wascaught installing equipment that taped transmissions in an ATM. That July he was sentenced to from one to six months in prison.

Neff said Urziceanu was later arrested in Israel in a similar case but was not convicted of that crime.

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International grifter gets 5 years in prison for Denver credit card cloning scam - The Denver Post