Subject:
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Twins accused of stealing and selling LEGO® sets on Ebay®
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.mediawatch
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Followup-To:
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lugnet.general
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Date:
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Tue, 12 Jul 2005 23:43:53 GMT
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(details)
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Watchout LEGO® is watching
From the Journal Inquirer online edition
July 6, 2005
ENFIELD, CT. -- Police have accused twin brothers of stealing nearly $42,000
worth of Star Wars-theme LEGO sets from the toymaker’s facility here and selling
some of them on eBay. Mark and Christopher Crease, both 33, were charged with
first-degree larceny and conspiracy to commit first-degree larceny after a
lengthy police investigation into a merchandise shortage at LEGO Systems Inc.
Mark Crease, of 8 Bowles Road in Stafford, was employed at LEGO distribution
center off Taylor Road. Christopher Crease, of 60 Cottage Road in Enfield, had
worked there in the past, according to the affidavit released in court on
Tuesday.
The brothers were arraigned Friday in Superior Court and are scheduled to appear
in court on July 14. They were released on nonsurety bonds.
On March 10, a LEGO human resources employee alerted police to a shortage in one
item in the distributor’s inventory, a Star Wars Destroyer LEGO set valued at
$299 apiece, according to the affidavit.
LEGO employees told investigators they had begun their own investigation into
the shortage at the end of December, when about 140 units of the toy set were
reported missing and removed from the inventory management system, according to
the affidavit. The product is sold only in company stores and through the LEGO
catalog.
The LEGO supervisors began searching eBay for sellers in the area, and turned up
three different names peddling the item from a local address through the online
auction site, according to the affidavit. The supervisors suspected an employee
had taken the items, the affidavit adds.
Police investigators intervened and set up a sting-operation, purchasing sets
from each of the sellers to obtain their names and addresses, according to the
affidavit.
They noticed two of the user names selling the toy set, “yamyz110hff” and
“hondacr” had previous eBay histories selling motorcycle and ATV parts -- an
interest that LEGO employees knew the Crease brothers shared, according to the
affidavit.
Police contacted eBay to obtain more information about the sellers, and were
alerted that they had changed their names to “teamgreenkxt” and “1975pontiacta,”
according to the affidavit.
Despite changing their names, the Creases were unable to escape a fraud
investigator from eBay, who delivered to police the real names of the users, who
were registered as Kelly Crease and Christopher Crease, according to the
affidavit.
While investigators were interviewing Kelly Crease, who is Mark’s wife, she
“began to cry” and “stated that she was aware of stolen Lego sets being sold by
her husband” on eBay, according to the affidavit.
Mark Crease told police he had bought the sets from another employee, Hector
Rivera, 38, of Chicopee, Mass., who he said was probably stealing the sets and
reselling them for $30, according to the affidavit.
He said his wife had been out of work for five weeks, and he had tried to make
up for about a $1,700 shortfall by selling the sets, according to the affidavit.
On April 15, Rivera told investigators that he had been contacted about five or
six months earlier by Christopher Crease, who asked him to steal the toy sets,
and he admitted bringing them to Crease’s house to sell, according to the
affidavit.
Christopher Crease told police that Rivera left the boxes of toys, along with a
written note, on the porch of his Cottage Road home and that he had paid Rivera
cash in return, according to the affidavit.
Mark Crease admitted selling 24 of the sets on eBay, and Christopher told police
he sold 44 of them on the same Internet auction Web site, the affidavit says.
Rivera has yet to be arrested in connection with the case.
-end of report
http://.www.zwire.comsitenews.cfmnewsid=14813462&BRD=985&PAG=461&dept_id=161556&rfi=6
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