New York man sentenced in fraud scheme linked to Reading
Jan. 26—A New York City man was sentenced Friday for his role in a mail fraud scheme targeting senior citizens that Berks County investigators helped bring down, prosecutors announced.
Yeurys Peguero-Rosario, 25, was sentenced to 21 months in federal prison and three years of supervised release during a hearing before U.S. District Judge Robert Mariani in Scranton.
According to U.S. Attorney Gerard Karam:
Peguero-Rosario and four other New York City men regularly traveled to various locations in Pennsylvania and Ohio during a four-month period in 2020 to retrieve mailed packages containing thousands of dollars in cash.
These packages were sent by elderly victims who were persuaded to send the money based on false claims that their grandchildren had been arrested and charged with serious vehicular crimes and, consequently, were in immediate need of money.
During the hearing Friday, Peguero-Rosario was ordered to pay $220,000 in restitution to the victims of the scheme.
Although the scam involved no Berks County victims, county detectives filed the initial charges in the case after discovering DeJesus and his co-defendants were picking up the parcels containing cash in Reading.
The charges followed a six-month investigation that was labor intensive and involved the collection and processing of physical evidence, Chief County Detective Michael Gombar told the Reading Eagle at the time the charges were announced.
Gombar said detectives obtained search warrants for various records that were analyzed and led to the identification of additional victims. They identified 11 victims from nine states who were directed to send money to various locations in Reading.
The matter was later transferred to the Philadelphia branch of the Federal Bureau of Investigation for further investigation.
