A Waco jewelry store owner and an alleged conspirator have been indicted on money laundering charges tied to a Texas robbery ring. The front counter sold rings. The back counter, prosecutors allege, sold cover.
Darwin Alberto Corea Calderon was sentenced this week for a three-year scheme that drained more than $464,000 from Home Depot stores across the Carolinas. The mechanism was smaller than a Ponzi and older than the self-checkout aisle.
A group called RBK built a working business out of Amazon's customer service window, charging clients 15 to 30 percent to file fraudulent refund claims on high-value electronics and keeping the goods. The machine ran for over two years before Amazon sued. The eleven people sentenced last week for a parallel operation suggest this was never a small problem.