HOUSTON – Several people have been charged in a sweeping credit card fraud investigation involving several Houston and Harris County restaurants. Detectives with the Harris County Sheriff's Office, US Postal Inspectors and fraud investigators with several banks worked in concert on this investigation.
Investigators said at least 193 people had their credit cards "skimmed" and then "cloned". Investigators said "skimming" happens when someone secretly uses a portable device to record a card number, then uses the information to create a "clone" of the card.
One of those charged in this case is Chelsea Loren Watts, 24, who detectives said "skimmed" several customer's credit cards when she worked as a waitress at Houston's restaurant on Kirby. The general manager for the restaurant declined to comment on the charges against Watts, only saying she was no longer an employee.
Watts and her attorney, Joe Vinas, both declined to comment.
Along with Watts, Michael Scott Tweed, 41, Charles Gulama, 35, and Tatanisha Deshawn Shields, 37, were charged with engaging in organized criminal activity. Investigators said the stolen card numbers were used to make fraudulent purchases totaling more than $140,000.
Investigators said Tweed, Gulama and Shields were caught on surveillance video using "cloned" cards to make purchases at stores or withdraw cash from ATMs.
Court records read several of the fraudulent charges were run through PayPal accounts linked to a printing business owned by Tweed. Investigators said they discovered Tweed also used an eBay account to purchase nearly two dozen portable magnetic strip readers used to record credit card information, a USB device used to encode that information onto a card and 200 credit card blanks.
Detectives said at the time of his arrest, Tweed was already facing charges of credit card abuse in a separate case.
Detectives said this continuing because they believe more people are involved given the large number of stolen card numbers.
