New York authorities have indicted two men accused of withdrawing more than $17,000 from ATMs using Dunkin' Donut gift cards that they had re-encoded with stolen bank account information.
Romanian nationals Daniel Gheorghe and Ionel Cristian Popa are accused of performing multiple unauthorised withdrawals at cash machines belonging to a Chase bank in Hollis, Queens.
According to a statement, police spotted the pair in the vestibule of the branch using Dunkin' Donuts rechargeable gift cards that had been re-encoded with stolen account information belonging to various banks - including Chase, Bank of America, Citi and HSBC.
They were arrested and found to have $17,703 in stolen funds and 66 Dunkin' Donut gift cards on them and in their vehicle. None of the sixteen digit account numbers displayed on the seized cards matched those encoded on the magnetic strips.
District Attorney Richard Brown says: "Instead of going on a run for coffee and doughnuts with their gift cards, the defendants are instead accused of going to the bank and using its ATMs as their personal slot machines, cashing out large sums of money with each use of their 'doctored' Dunkin' Donut gift cards."
The men were arraigned on Thursday on a 70-count indictment, each of them charged with one count of third-degree grand larceny, one of third-degree criminal possession of stolen property, sixty-six of second-degree criminal possession of a forged instrument, and two of first-degree scheme to defraud. If found guilty they face hefty jail sentences.