A group of moped-riding migrants terrorizing New Yorkers used a hacker to breach bank accounts and make charges to stores like Home Depot, cops revealed as they shared new details on the “sophisticated” high-tech crime ring.
The crew — and others like it — include people from several nations, including Venezuela, Ecuador, Honduras and Mexico, NYPD Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny told reporters.
“There’s not a Venezuelan shelter, there’s not a Mexican shelter,” he said. “They’re all brought in together, along with other groups as well.”
But the Venezuelan-led gangs — including the suspected crooks busted yesterday, who were directed by a Venezuelan migrant named Victor Parra, 30, of the Bronx — tend to be more organized, Kenny said.
“Like you saw with yesterday’s [robbery ring bust] — where the proceeds are being shipped to Miami, Houston and eventually Colombia — they’re a little more sophisticated in that they’re hacking into the phones, stealing people’s banking records,” Kenny said.
“They’re getting into their Venmo, they’re getting into their Zelle accounts and they’re using that money to make purchases,” he continued. “They’ll clear out the accounts, and then they make purchases … at Home Depot, or [they make] money transfers to other accounts, or cash.”
Once they’ve exhausted the accounts, they ship the phone overseas to be sold, he added.
At least one member of the moped gang — Cleyber Andrade, age 19 — was set to be arraigned Tuesday evening for crimes in connection with the wider ring, which has been fingered for 62 different instances of grand larceny throughout the Big Apple since November.
That includes a shocking, caught-on-video heist in which a 62-year-old woman was brutally dragged down a Brooklyn street just three days after Christmas, police sources told The Post.
The thieves made off with the woman’s bag, keys, phone, credit cards, and glasses — all while she careened through the air and slammed into a metal bike rack.
The video highlighted the gang’s vicious tactics, which they used to snatch people’s purses, phones and other belongings by any means necessary, according to cops and sources.
Authorities busted Andrade and an alleged accomplice, Juan Uzcatgui, 23, on Monday.
Both were charged individually Saturday with grand larceny for stealing a moped, resisting arrest, and stolen property offenses.
Cops hoped to arrest Parra, the ringleader, after Andrade and Uzcatgui gave him up– buit that hasn’t happened yet, sources said.
Cops have also identified six other people connected to the ring: Yan Jimenez, 25, of Manhattan; Anthony Ramos, 21, of Manhattan; Richard Saledo, 21, of the Bronx; Beike Jimenez, 21, of the Bronx; Maria Manaura, 32, of Manhattan; and Samuel Castro, 27, of Queens, according to sources.
Parra’s operation was allegedly a well-oiled machine, with the ringleader blasting out texts on WhatsApp describing what kind of phone he was looking for, then telling his henchmen to “go get’em.”
Scooter drivers allegedly made $100 a day, and the actual phone snatcher could make $300 to $600 per stolen device, according to cops.
The robbery ring — and others like it — worry law enforcement specifically because the migrants often have multiple aliases and swap identities and birthdays, turning them into so-called “ghost perps” who become very hard to track, sources said.