A man from the Calgary area is being charged in connection with a scam that allegedly saw him open nearly 100 cell phone contracts and obtain many new phones as a result.
Authorities allege the 37-year-old from Chestermere, just east of Calgary, defrauded cell phone retailers across Alberta and B.C.
Police say he would pose as the owner or a representative of a small business and use forged business registration documents to open an account with Telus or Bell. He then allegedly received new cell phones on credit, but never paid the amount owed.
Investigators believe he opened 70 small business accounts and obtained 143 brand-new iPhones, worth approximately $255,469, in 97 separate incidents.
“Due to the volume and value of phones that were fraudulently obtained, and the fact that this fraud is affecting small local cell phone retailers, we are warning the public about this prolific scam,” said Edmonton police Staff Sgt. Marc Dehid.
“We want to warn business owners to be on the lookout for the accused, and to make sure they’re verifying customer identification according to their anti-fraud policies.”
On March 30, Quoc-Tuan Huynh, also known as Jimmy Huynh, was charged with two counts of fraud over $5000. He was later charged with two counts of uttering a forged document. The allegations against him have not been tested in court.
The police investigation into Huynh began in January.