Miguel Bell was a ladies' man, but he wasn't just interested in romance, federal authorities said yesterday.
Instead, they say, Bell was the ringleader of a Philadelphia-based bank-fraud and identity-theft ring who parlayed his liaisons with bank employees to get customers' personal information and account numbers.
A federal grand jury charged that Bell and four others - Christopher Russell, Kareem Russell, Michael Merin and Tamika Brown, all of Philadelphia and all in their 30s - recruited 24 others to help steal $1.3 million from the bank accounts of their victims.
The indictment listed 33 victims, but Assistant U.S. Attorney K.T. Newton said yesterday that hundreds of people had been victimized - all of whom have been made whole by the eight banks in which they had accounts.
The feds said that the conspiracy began in September 2005 and lasted until November 2008.
The indictment alleged that Bell and Merin recruited bank workers to provide personal and account information of customers.
Bell and Christopher Russell, identified as Bell's alleged "right-hand man," then verified balances in bank accounts they targeted by calling the banks' automated-services line to access account information, the charging papers said.
Bell, 34, who was arrested Tuesday and was being detained pending a court hearing, allegedly arranged for phony driver's licenses to be made for "check runners" that he and the two Russells recruited, the indictment said.
The check runners posed as bank customers to cash bogus checks and withdraw funds from the targeted accounts, authorities said.
On many occasions, in a separate car, Bell accompanied Christopher Russell, Brown and the check runners to and from branches of the banks and maintained contact with them via cellphone when they were in the banks, the indictment said.
Many of the check runners - who were charged separately - are drug addicts, the feds said. Several pretended to be multiple customers of different banks and cashed checks at bank branches as far away as Indiana and Michigan, the indictment said.
Once the check runners cashed the phony checks, Bell or Christopher Russell would collect the proceeds and pay them, according to the indictment.
Bell's attorney, Robert Gamburg, said that he was still reviewing the indictment and that Bell maintains his innocence.
Authorities said that Kareem Russell recruited check runners, provided them with phony driver's licenses and bogus checks, and also collected their proceeds after they cashed the fake checks.
Merin, already serving a 13-year federal prison sentence in another bank-fraud and aggravated-identity-theft case, is alleged to have persuaded bank employees to give up confidential personal information about bank customers and their accounts.
Brown allegedly provided check runners with clothing for their driver's-license photos and trips to banks to cash checks. The feds said that she also accompanied check runners and Christopher Russell on trips to cash checks at banks.
A federal magistrate ordered Brown temporarily jailed yesterday pending a detention hearing tomorrow.
The two Russells are in state custody. Christopher Russell was charged earlier this year in a string of beatings and robberies of elderly women in Northeast Philadelphia.
Authorities said that 11 bank employees, a car dealership employee, an insurance company employee and eight check runners also were charged separately in the case.
Most have pleaded guilty to conspiracy, bank fraud and aggravated identity theft, prosecutors said. An 11th bank employee was convicted at trial.
All face sentences of at least two years behind bars.
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