Alameda County
Alameda County DA’s Office Charges 3 in Sophisticated EBT Card Cloning Fraud Case
The complaint filed by Interim District Attorney Royl Roberts also alleges the three defendants did with intent to defraud use for the purpose of obtaining money, goods, services, and anything else of value, an access card and access card account information that had been altered, obtained, and retained, and an access card with knowledge that it was forged, expired, and revoked.
Special to The Post
The Alameda County District Attorney’s Office Tuesday charged three co-defendants with multiple felonies for an alleged large-scale fraud operation using Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) cards to withdraw thousands of dollars from the accounts of at least 10 victims.
The three co-defendants — Mate Catalin, Dennis Ionescu, and Maria Tudor — are charged with one count of fraudulent possession of personal information, one count of grand theft, and one count of theft by fraudulent access card, all felonies.
It is further alleged that the manner in which the crime was carried out indicates planning, sophistication, or professionalism.
The complaint filed by Interim District Attorney Royl Roberts also alleges the three defendants did with intent to defraud use for the purpose of obtaining money, goods, services, and anything else of value, an access card and access card account information that had been altered, obtained, and retained, and an access card with knowledge that it was forged, expired, and revoked.
It is further alleged that the value of all money, goods, services, and other things of value so obtained exceeded $950 in a consecutive six-month period.
The criminal complaint stems from a joint investigation with federal law enforcement and the Fremont Police Department on or about Jan. 2, in which the defendants were allegedly observed fraudulently using the personal identifying information of multiple EBT card users to withdraw cash from several ATM machines using cloned EBT cards in Fremont.
Catalin, Ionescu, and Tudor were arraigned on Monday at the East County Hall of Justice in Dublin. If convicted of all charges, the three defendants each face up to three years in prison.
The Alameda County District Attorney’s office is the source of this report.
