Attorney, associate tried to sell a million masks to NY for twice the value, feds say

Two men have been arrested after allegedly trying to resell 1 million N95 masks in New York, at prices two to three times higher than their value, according to the Department of Justice.

Hoarding life-saving supplies to sell at an inflated cost is illegal under the Defense Production Act ordered by the White House in March.

Kent Bulloch, 56-year-old attorney, was arrested in California and will teleconference his federal court appearance from San Francisco, while his alleged accomplice William Young, Sr., 64, will do so from Phoenix, according to the DOJ news release.

“As alleged, the defendants conspired to turn a huge profit from the urgent need for surgical masks in New York during the pandemic,” Richard Donoghue, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said.

“When the Attorney General said that those engaged in price gouging should expect a knock on the door, he meant it and when we knock with one hand, we usually have a warrant in the other.”

Claiming they could get their hands on over a million N95 masks, the alleged price gougers had been looking for investors to sell the masks at marked-up prices, according to the news release.

At one point, Bulloch is accused of trying to hide the inflated prices by creating an escrow agreement that falsely states a profit of no greater than 10 percent will be made through the sale of the N95s.

The agreement was made for a potential investor, who turned out to be an undercover federal agent, according to the DOJ.

“This is precisely the type of price gouging for which Attorney General Barr created our nationwide task force,” said Craig Carpenito, head of the DOJ’s nationwide COVID-19 Hoarding and Price Gouging Task Force.“The Department of Justice will not allow greedy profiteers to take advantage of the public during this health crisis.”

If convicted, both men could face up to a year in prison.