A Kern County woman has been sentenced to five years in prison for running a major credit card fraud scheme.
Wasco Resident Karina Arceo, 34, will also have three years of supervised release when she leaves prison in five years.
The big picture: Arceo is guilty of conspiring to commit bank fraud and committing aggravated identity theft.
- The credit card scheme resulted in a loss of over $825,000.
How it happened: From February 2016 to through August 2022, Arceo and partner and co-defendant Miguel Leyva stole the identity of over 125 victims.
- Much of the identity theft came from patient files at healthcare providers in Kern County, where Arceo worked.
- Arceo and Leyva used the stolen identities to open thousands of fraudulent credit cards in the victims’ identities and made hundreds of thousands of dollars in fraudulent purchases on those cards in Fresno County, Kern County, the Bay Area and other places.
- Some of the fraudulent purchases included home appliances, furniture, art, automobile accessories, designer clothing, shoes, luxury camping equipment, tickets to concerts and sporting events, as well as travel. They used the credit cards to remodel their home kitchen and their child’s room.
- They also resold many of the items they fraudulently purchased for cash.
Go deeper: Text messages between Arceo and Leyva showed that Arceo was the leader of the scheme.
- According to court documents, Arceo would pull the stolen information used to open the fraudulent credit cards from her cloud account and send it to Leyva.
- Arceo would then coach Leyva on how to make the fraudulent purchase, including telling him which cashiers to target at stores and what to say if they started asking questions.
- Text messages also showed that Arceo used lyrics from a popular hip-hop song to describe herself as being “the boss” of the scheme who “makes money move,” while Leyva was just a “worker.”
- Leyva wrote a letter from prison trying to minimize Arceo’s role in the scheme and identified himself as the leader. The court rejected that argument.
Flashback: Leyva was already sentenced to 65 months in prison.
What they’re saying: “The defendant used patient healthcare files to commit fraud and identity theft instead of treating those files with the care and sensitivity they deserve,” said U.S. Attorney Phillip Talbert. “Let this case serve as a warning to those who consider abusing such access to patient files: my office will work tirelessly with the FBI and our law enforcement partners to investigate and prosecute fraud and identity theft crimes committed with sensitive patient information.”
- FBI Sacramento Special Agent in Charge Sid Patel said Arceo violated her employer’s trust to fuel an elaborate, greed-driven scheme.
- “This case should serve as a reminder to all to freeze and routinely check your credit to ensure accounts are not opened without your knowledge,” Patel said. “It is also a reminder to would-be criminals that the FBI will identify and pursue anyone who abuses a position of trust to exploit others for personal gain.”
