SALT LAKE CITY – One of two men who headed a major identity theft ring that involved more than 25,000 credit union and bank checks and hundreds of victims last week was sentenced to more than five years in prison.
The statewide check fraud, which included checks drawn on America First CU, Beehive CU, Zions Bank, Key Bank and several others, was driven by the participants’ need to feed their addiction to methamphetamine, according to prosecutors. The counterfeit checks earned them more than $375,000.
The group created fake checks and matching identification and used a team of runners to cash the checks at local credit unions and banks. The proceeds then were split with the runners. The checks and the identification were created using personal information stolen from mailboxes and taken out of dumpsters.
Agents said some of the participants had ties to white supremacists. Sentenced last week was J.C. Flores, who received 65 months in prison and was ordered to pay almost $30,000 in restitution. His main accomplice, Todd Everson, was sentenced in April to 66 months in prison and ordered to pay $45,000 in restitution.
