A Nevada gentleman who posed as a coin-cashing corporation staff to steal hundreds of bucks from equipment at grocery and other merchants in several states was sentenced to 4 a long time in jail Thursday, prosecutors explained.
Richard Pena, 34, dressed as a worker for a coin-cashing enterprise and pretended to be there to support the machines, and then broke into them and then walked out with the coin vaults, the U.S. Attorney’s Business in Oregon claimed.
The prosecutor’s business office stated Pena “repeated this ruse dozens of times” to steal hundreds of hundreds of dollars as he traveled from Las Vegas to Oregon in a van.
When he was arrested in Washington point out in December 2021, sheriff’s deputies uncovered 1.5 million coins worthy of all-around $133,000 in bags and laundry baskets, in accordance to court files.
An alert keep staff contacted police, which led to the arrest, prosecutors explained.
Pena was indicted in March 2022 on fees of conspiracy and interstate transportation of stolen home. He agreed to plead responsible to conspiracy in a plea settlement in February of this yr, information demonstrate.
Pena was also sentenced to $581,858 in restitution, the U.S. Attorney’s Workplace claimed.
Damage to the devices and losses amounted to $715,000, it stated.
The split-ins transpired through 2021. Pena broke into machines from Las Vegas, the place he life, to the Portland, Oregon, region, prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memo.
“This was not pocket transform. Defendant ordinarily stole 1000’s of pounds at each individual shop and frequently strike multiple equipment a day,” prosecutors wrote.
Federal general public defenders wrote in a sentencing memo that Pena was inspired by an untreated compound abuse ailment, and that at the time of the crimes he was working with “a major quantity of methamphetamine daily.”
Prosecutors and defense attorneys agreed on the 48-thirty day period sentence and the restitution.
