Posted on 11/04/2005 2:58:25 PM PST by LurkedLongEnough
DALLAS -- A Target store employee alerted Dallas police to a recent extraordinary cellular telephone equipment purchase. A man bought $60,000 worth of hard-to-trace prepaid cell phones.
The size of the purchase raised suspicions among police investigators, who turned over the case to the FBI.
"Those notifications are taken seriously," former FBI agent Danny Defenbaugh said. "Anytime a business or private citizen sees that type of activity, they need to go the extra step and notify law enforcement."
The large purchase caused investigators to look toward possible homeland security threats. On two occasions during October, a man of Middle Eastern descent bought $30,000 worth of prepaid cell phones. Security experts told NBC 5 that the FBI would work to identify the man and determine why he would buy the hard-to-trace phones.
Officials with the FBI and Target declined to comment on the case other than to say they were pleased that the clerk reported the purchase.
Youn gotta bear in mind, a legitimate wholesale buyer who's got $60,000 dont have to buy at a Target retail store!
My first thought when reading this story was... who ordered that much stock of these phones? As you point out even at 100/each they would've had to have had hundreds of phones in their inventory... I wonder if they were all the same brand/style or whether he bought out ALL their inventory.
Seems to me like a LOT of phones to have in the stockroom, but then I'm not familiar with Target's ordering procedures/inventory management...
That was my first thought as well... who ordered enough stock to fill this purchase?
a) Terrorist
b) [insert your ethnic name here] Mafia
c) Drug Runners
I think when you buy them you can fill them with as many minutes as you want. So this could be a very few phones with lots of minutes each, or lots of phones with just a few minutes.
If you've ever had a teenager in the house, you know they can burn thru 2000 minutes in no time.
I was just telling my wife that we need to ban bicycles for this very same reason!
"... a man of Middle Eastern descent"
WAIT ! This is profiling !!
"... a man of Middle Eastern descent"
These people live among us !
And they are up to something not good...
Just checked, the more expensive ones are $50, the slightly cheaper ones $40, but that didn't include the cheapie TracPhone which is $20. Call it $50, that's 1200 phones, bought in two groups of 600 each. At $20 that would mean 3000 phones, in two groups of 1500 each. That would have to be a pretty big business, and then you'd buy them on a corporate account, and probably get them cheaper. OTOH, you could be using a prepaid credit card.
The thread has been dead for over a month.
What prompted you to post this so late?
Been on vacation and just get back?
" I think they have been paying attention."
They were arrested on immigration charges.
Welcome to Midland.
I shop at this Wal-mart all the time. Best deal on shells.
This is a HUGE Super-Walmart on I-20.
In fact, it is one of the biggest in the nation.
They have everything, all the time.
We profile in Midland.
The untold story is this Wal-Mart is:
(1) on I-20, which goes directly to El Paso (changes to I-10 on the way). Huge illegal immigrant port.
(2) Big Spring, Texas, which is about 10 miles from this Wal-Mart is home to the largest inland refinery in the United States.
I think the more likely scenario is that he comes from a country in which cell phones are expensive. If the phone is GSM capable such as T-Mobile phones he can buy 60K worth of phones, take them back to whatever country he is from and sell them on the open market for 2 to 3 times what he paid. While this needs to be investigated my guess is it's about money and not about terrorism.
Perhaps the person was buying them for the people who live in Omaha NE.
http://www.ketv.com/news/4431759/detail.html
At one time in the past you may have thought that. But this week alone there have been arrests in Ohio, Mi, Tx, Washington and more... for a multitude of cell phone purchases. All the arrests are middle eastern folks. Something is up and whatever it is.... we best be ready!
>>Why stop there? Drug dealers and terrorists use the internet too! Oh no! Let's just ban everything.
Don't forget the Interstate Highway System!
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