Wifredo A. Ferrer, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, George L. Piro, Special Agent in Charge, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Miami Field Office, and J.D. Patterson, Director, Miami-Dade Police Department (MDPD), made the announcement.

Rafael Duran, 43, of Miami, made his initial appearance before U.S. Magistrate Jonathan Goodman. Duran’s arraignment is scheduled for April 16, 2015.

Duran is charged, by indictment, with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and wire fraud offenses, punishable by up to twenty years in prison.

According to allegations contained in the indictment, Duran participated in a scheme to provide false police reports to individuals operating credit repair businesses. A co-conspirator would provide Duran with the personal identifying information of credit business customers. Duran would create false police reports, using the customers’ personal identifying information. The police reports would falsely represent that the customers had reported to the Miami-Dade Police Department facts consistent with having been victims of identity theft. Duran would cause the false police reports to become official records of the Miami-Dade Police Department. A member of the conspiracy, associated with the credit businesses, would cause the false police reports created by Duran to be transmitted to credit reporting agencies in order to induce the removal of negative items from the credit histories of the alleged victims identified in the false police reports. Duran created the false police reports in order to promote the success of the credit businesses and in return would receive payment and other things of value from his co-conspirators, including credit repair services.

Mr. Ferrer thanked the FBI Miami Area Corruption Task Force and MDPD Professional Compliance Bureau. This case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Davis.

An indictment is only an accusation and a defendant is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.

Related court documents and information may be found on the website of the District Court for the Southern District of Florida at www.flsd.uscourts.gov or on http://pacer.flsd.uscourts.gov.