Police bust up credit card ‘bust out’ scam

Jen Lawson

Friday, Dec. 26, 2003 | 9:42 a.m.

An Eastern European organized crime ring is believed to be behind a sophisticated credit card skimming scheme that netted the crooks about $100,000 since October, Metro Police said.

In cop talk, the scam is called a "bust out," and it's every credit card holder's worst nightmare.

Thieves set up a fake business and then, using stolen credit card information, they rack up charges of thousands of dollars a day to each credit card. They then deposit the funds into an account and cash out the account, Detective Kim Thomas explained.

In this case the scheme involved a fake business, Wireless R Us, 1105 S. Rainbow Blvd. Accomplices who worked in restaurants in California used small illegal devices -- known as skimmers -- to record credit card information from unsuspecting patrons' credit cards and downloaded the numbers onto a computer.

They then created duplicate credit cards using plain white plastic cards available at hardware stores and quickly maxed them out, depositing the funds in an account for the ring.

"It's a huge way to make money very quickly," Thomas said.

It's also a racket that can't go on for long without authorities noticing, police said.

When the owners of the credit cards started receiving their bills and disputing the charges, an employee of a credit card company called Metro last week and reported a possible bust-out.

"He said this one just doesn't feel good," Lt. Steve Franks said. "There were two phony transactions and (the customers) said they had never been to Las Vegas."

Detectives quickly converged on Wireless R Us.

Metro investigates about six bust-out scams per year, but they usually catch wind of it after the suspects have abandoned their activities.

This case was a coup for detectives because the suspects' tools of the trade were still inside the fake business and police were able to raid two homes before evidence was destroyed. They found computers, counterfeit credit cards, financial information and government checks in other peoples' names.

Detectives are gathering information on several suspects, but no one has been arrested.

When detectives do make arrests, they expect the kingpin to be Russian, Franks said.

"Usually when we arrest them, we find a Russian behind the scenes" of this type of operation, he said.

Credit card holders who were victimized can dispute the charges, and they can be removed from their bills, but consumers as a whole ultimately pay in the form of higher interest rates and fees, Franks pointed out.

Consumers should "never let credit cards out of their sight," Franks said. "Walk it up to the cash register."