14 DAY TRIAL // A Florida judge has sentenced a recidivist career ATM skimmer to 70 months in prison for installing ATM skimming devices in several US states and defrauding users of over $900,000 from their debit cards.
Sorin Condrache, 36, of Craiova, Romania, also got three years of supervised release and will have to pay restitution fees of $905,901, the sum he stole from his victims.
Crook installed ATM skimmers in five US states
According to court documents, the suspect was arrested and charged with installing ATM skimming devices on ATMs located in five US states, namely Florida, Georgia, Maryland, North Carolina, and Tennessee.
Condrache used a skimming device that was placed over the card insertion slot, which recorded data from the debit card's magnetic strip.
The crook also used a pinhole camera, which he installed on the ATM, in order to save the PIN codes entered by each person who used the ATM.
With the data he gathered via the ATM skimmer, Condrache cloned debit cards or created gift cards, which he used to withdraw money from the victims' bank accounts.
Authorities said that Condrache operated together with a team but offered no details on the crew's actions.
This is Condrache's second brush with the law for ATM skimming
This is not the first time Condrache gets a prison sentence for ATM skimming. Back in 2006, he served a four-year prison sentence after he was arrested and convicted in Ireland.
Irish authorities arrested Condrache together with two other Romanian nationals, a man and a woman, Razvan Schiopu and Daniela Ciocan.
Officials said they found false ATM front sections, skimming machines, cameras, 75 blank plastic ATM cards, and €20,000 ($22,200) in cash, at the house the three were living in.
Romanian criminals are known to be very apt in ATM skimming operations, but it is strange to see a Romanian gang operating across the Atlantic.
