Enterprise corruption and identity theft in Queens County, New York
A friend and colleague called me yesterday morning and told me that Justice Buchter needed me in his part to represent a defendant. He explained that Justice Buchter had requested the services of lawyers authorized to accept court appointments as there were 109 defendants who needed to be represented by lawyers who were certified to handle serious felonies in one of the largest cases ever prosecuted in Queens County in terms of the number of defendants.
When I got out of the elevator on the third floor of the Queens Supreme Court, I was greeted by the senior photographer from the New York Post. Ellis Kaplan is a great photographer even if he does consistently refuse to take a picture of me in the court room, although he has shot numerous of my more infamous clients while conveniently cropping me out of the picture. True to form, he did not take a picture of me in the process. He did tell me that he was quite happy with the purchase of a Canon 7D that I constantly raved about after he initially recommended it to me.
When I arrived in the courtroom, I was pleased to see that sitting in the first row were most of the better lawyers in the county. A place was made for me, I sat down and asked what was happening They told me that the district attorney decided to try and arrest all identity theft with respect to credit cards in Queens by making an enterprise corruption case out against about 109 defendants. The defendants were charged with various permutations of identity theft, aggravated identity theft, unlawful possession of personal identification information and different grades of larceny.
The multiple indictments alleged that under the leadership of about four or five of the defendants, a scheme was hatched whereby bank employees would steal identity information from customers and give the information to others who would manufacture credit cards that were used by "shoppers" who would either make A.T.M. withdrawals or buy articles that could be readily sold. Other defendants operated "skimmers," machines that would read the magnetic credit card information when the cards were used for legitimate purchases. Unusually high bail was asked for under the watchful eyes of the fifth estate which was granted for the most part.
As we chatted I realized that the case was nowhere near the 458 count indictment that I obtained an acquittal on after a nineteen month trial about twenty five years agowhen I served as a public defender in Queens before obtaining an acquittal as a public defender twenty five years ago. Nevertheless, it promised to be an interesting case. Based upon comments made by the prosecutors, I suspect that significantly fewer than 109 defendants will ultimately be convicted. Only time will tell.