Man uses victims’ cash for TVs, lobster tails in North Texas Walmart gift card fraud: police
Four people accused of altering Walmart gift cards in North Texas and defrauding at least 1,000 victims were indicted Friday, according to court records.
Geandy O’Reilly, Anisel Matososa, Ernesto Mato and Maylias Novoa were arrested Sept. 29 after investigators found evidence linking them to a Walmart gift card crime ring, Colleyville police said in a news release Friday.
In July, an elderly Colleyville resident contacted police after sending a $100 gift card to a friend in Louisiana and learning it had a zero dollar balance. The number on the gift card didn’t match the number on the authorization receipt, police said.
Colleyville police reached out to Walmart Global Investigations, which learned the gift card the victim bought had been re-encoded to match a different Walmart gift card. A man bought beer and a KitchenAid stand mixer with the victim’s $100. The items were purchased at two Walmart stores in Tarrant County, officials said.
Less than a week later, Colleyville police learned about a second person who had bought a $50 Walmart gift card for a fellow church member. That card was also found to have a zero dollar balance when the recipient tried to redeem it.
Detectives with the Colleyville Police Department teamed up with Walmart investigators and the U.S. Secret Service to work on the case. They identified O’Reilly as a suspect and conducted surveillance on him and his accomplices, police said in the release.
O’Reilly, who was on probation after having pleaded guilty to similar offenses in 2022, traveled to Walmart stores across Texas, authorities said. He put re-encoded Walmart gift cards on the display stands while his accomplices acted as lookouts.
When a cloned card was purchased, the 42-year-old used the money put on the card by the victim for his personal profit, police said.
According to the news release, O’Reilly bought over $5,700 worth of jewelry, more than $5,600 worth of kitchen appliances, $2,500 worth of lobster tails at Sam’s Club and over $3,300 worth of large-screen TVs with the stolen money.
Colleyville police detectives were in contact with 15 victims in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. The total number of victims is more than 1,000, officials said in the release.
After O’Reilly and the three other suspects were arrested, investigators executed a search warrant of his residence and vehicles. According to the release, they seized nearly 7,000 Walmart gift cards, two card readers, around $3,180 in cash, 50 cases of Modelo Especial beer, 38 cases of Corona Extra beer, one laptop computer, six cellphones, six flat-screen TVs and a PlayStation 5.
Investigators also found evidence on O’Reilly’s cellphone that led them to similar crime rings in multiple states, officials said. Some of those people have already been arrested and other investigations are pending.
Colleyville Police Chief Michael Miller said the investigation was a collaboration on the part of state, local and federal law enforcement agencies.
“This complex, multi-state gift card fraud investigation started because a vigilant Colleyville resident noticed discrepancies with a gift card they purchased and decided to call the police,” Miller said in the release. “With over 1,000 victims, and almost 7,000 fraudulent gift cards seized, this investigation was truly massive.”
O’Reilly, Matososa, Mato and Novoa are currently in the Tarrant County Jail, according to court records. The charges against them include engaging in organized criminal activity, theft of property, money laundering and fraudulent possession/use of credit or debit cards.
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