Syracuse Man Charged With Credit-Card Cloning Scheme

SYRACUSE, NEW YORK – Deonte Spencer, 35, of Syracuse, New York, was detained without bail following a hearing yesterday in federal court in connection with an indictment charging him with participating in a credit-card cloning scheme, announced United States Attorney Richard S. Hartunian.

The Indictment charges Spencer with one count of wire-fraud conspiracy, one count of access-device fraud, and one count of aggravated identity theft. The charges filed against Spencer carry a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison for the wire-fraud charge, 15 years in prison for the access-device fraud charge, and, with respect to the aggravated identity theft charge, a two-year mandatory minimum sentence, which must run consecutive to the sentence imposed on the other charges. The charges also carry a maximum fine of up to $250,000, and a term of supervised release of up to three years. A defendant’s sentence is imposed by a judge based on the particular statute the defendant is charged with violating, the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other factors.

A jury trial is scheduled for July 24, 2017 before Senior United States District Court Judge Frederick J. Scullin, Jr.

The Indictment alleges that Spencer participated in a scheme that involved the purchase of stolen credit card numbers belonging to numerous victims and the fabrication of cloned credit cards. The Indictment also alleges that Spencer and his co-conspirators used cloned credit cards to purchase tens of thousands of dollars of merchandise and prepaid gift cards from 2015 through 2016 in Syracuse, New York, and North Carolina.

The charges in the indictment are merely accusations. The defendant is presumed innocent until proven guilty.

This case is being investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the United States Postal Inspection Service, the Syracuse Police Department – Gang Violence Task Force, the New York State Police, and the Town of Dewitt Police Department, and is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Nicolas Commandeur.