Two Romanian nationals were indicted by a federal grand jury in Virginia Wednesday and charged with bank fraud, debit card fraud, and aggravated identity theft. Florin Bersanu, 31, and Viorel Naboiu, 43, are accused of installing skimming devices on ATMs in Virginia, West Virginia, and Florida according to the indictment. The skimming devices would capture the customer’s debit card numbers when they inserted their cards into the ATM slot during transactions. A federal search warrant obtained by Crime Insider Jon Burkett revealed that the two men lived in Henrico County and targeted Henrico banks. According to the indictment, the men are accused of stealing at least $42,756.80 from BB&T Bank and Henrico Federal Credit Union in Virginia, United Bank in West Virginia, and Pen Air Federal Credit Union and Eglin Federal Credit Union in Florida.
A federal search warrant listed the number of affected accounts:
• 63 accounts: BB&T bank in the 3200 block of Skipwith Road
• 40 accounts: Other BB&T banks in Central Virginia
• 10 accounts: Henrico Federal Credit Union
• 87 accounts: BB&T banks in Newport News
• 235 accounts: West Virginia
• 226 accounts: Pen Air Credit Union in Pensacola, Florida
“Bersanu and Naboiu also installed small, covert surveillance cameras, disguised to blend into the ATMs’ exterior, which videoed the finger movements of bank customers as they entered their PINs during the transactions,” according to court documents. “The defendants later encoded the skimmed debit card numbers onto blank plastic magnetic stripe cards, and using the videoed PINs they made cash withdrawals from the victim customers’ bank accounts.” Bersanu and Naboiu have been charged with conspiracy to commit bank fraud, bank fraud, aggravated identity theft and access device fraud. If convicted, they face maximum possible sentences of 30 years on the bank fraud and conspiracy to commit bank fraud charges, 10 years on the access device fraud charge, and a mandatory minimum of two years for aggravated identity theft. [Source: WTVR6 News]
