Based on the FBI, burglars who just lately focused well-known athletes comparable to Patrick Mahomes, Travis Kelce and Joe Burrow bounced from metropolis to metropolis utilizing vehicles they rented with pretend IDs. They ditched the vehicles as wanted, together with the burner telephones they used to coordinate with each other.
They might conceal in woods whereas monitoring the patterns of safety guards, then break into the houses of rich athletes by breaking small home windows or prying open sliding doorways earlier than changing jewel-encrusted watches, designer baggage, gold chains and rings into money, utilizing loot launderers removed from their victims.
Their booty had an estimated worth of about $3 million, taken from a few of America’s best-known athletes.
However the seven Chilean burglars who focused the star athletes over three months late final 12 months additionally made some rookie errors that allowed regulation enforcement to ultimately catch up, as detailed in a 20-page affidavit included in a federal prison grievance unsealed Tuesday.
Within the doc, the FBI lays out how the gang members had been undone by allegedly posting photographs for co-conspirators to see through an iCloud web site.
Photos obtained and launched by the FBI present three of the alleged burglars, together with an unidentified fourth man, posing with watches apparently stolen from the house of Milwaukee Bucks ahead Bobby Portis Jr. Largely due to the pictures, the lads are in federal custody and have been charged with conspiracy to commit interstate transportation of stolen property. They may withstand 10 years in jail.
The Chilean gang “is thought to journey all through the USA and burglarize residences belonging to common and well-known skilled athletes” from the NFL, NBA and NHL, the prison grievance says. The gang “is accountable for stealing jewellery, costly model watches, United States foreign money, and different high-value merchandise.”
The gang’s strategies included dividing “obligations to every member comparable to renting automobiles, acquiring inns or short-stay leases, buying fraudulent identification and contacting ‘fences’ (consumers) of the stolen merchandise,” the grievance, which was filed Jan. 30 in Florida, states.
Police closed in on a New York pawn store, allegedly linked to the ring, earlier this month.
Key to the burglars’ success, to date, has been a capability to watch not solely their victims’ schedules but additionally the actions of police investigators and safety groups watching over the athletes’ houses, the affidavit says.
The FBI hasn’t recognized the athletes by title, however the dates and places listed within the prison grievance coincide with well-publicized burglaries on the Kansas Metropolis-area houses of Mahomes and Kelce, in addition to the houses of Portis in Milwaukee and Burrow in Anderson Township, Ohio. The grievance additionally lists two unidentified athletes, one from the Memphis Grizzlies and one other from the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
Mahomes and Kelce had been the primary identified victims, in early October, one in every of them throughout the Oct. 7 “Monday Night time Soccer” sport in opposition to the New Orleans Saints at Arrowhead Stadium. The unnamed Bucs participant was focused on Oct. 21 throughout a contest in opposition to the Baltimore Ravens. Portis’ residence was struck Nov. 2 in Milwaukee throughout a sport in opposition to the Cleveland Cavaliers. Burrow’s residence within the Cincinnati space was burglarized throughout a Dec. 9 sport on the Dallas Cowboys. And the unnamed Grizzlies participant’s residence was burglarized throughout a Dec. 19 residence contest in opposition to the Golden State Warriors.
No info is supplied relating to doable NHL victims recognized by the FBI, or extra NBA victims, however near the time of the Kansas Metropolis burglaries, the Dallas Stars’ Tyler Seguin reported a house break-in, with watches valued at $500,000 reportedly taken. In December, an estimated $23,000 in jewellery was stolen from Luka Doncic’s Dallas residence earlier than a commerce despatched the Mavericks star to Los Angeles. It isn’t clear if authorities consider the Chilean gang is behind the Seguin and Doncic heists.
The FBI agent who submitted the affidavit, whose title is blacked out, ascribes excessive ranges of sophistication to the seven defendants for the best way they recognized their targets, discovered vulnerabilities in residence safety programs and discovered convert the high-value loot into money by way of “fences.” The boys allegedly used pretend IDs, a number of rental vehicles and burner telephones to maintain from being tracked as they traveled throughout the nation between burglaries.
On the similar time, the agent recognized a sequence of blunders that helped regulation enforcers establish the culprits and, crucially, join them on to most of the stolen gadgets. The errors included a sequence of selfies that the alleged burglars, in line with the grievance, apparently shared with others as if to promote their exploits. They uploaded the photographs to a safe Apple iCloud account, however the FBI was in a position to entry it with a search warrant.
In a single notably profitable housebreaking, apparently the one at Portis’ residence, gang members broke open a protected “containing a number of watches, chains, private gadgets, jewellery, and money. Additionally stolen was a Louis Vuitton suitcase and designer baggage.” The full worth of the gadgets exceeded $1.48 million, the grievance says, figuring out the sufferer solely as “Athlete 4.”
On Nov. 3, Portis posted on X: “I contemplate Milwaukee my residence. Final night time, whereas I used to be at work, my residence was burglarized, and plenty of of my prized possessions had been stolen. When you’ve got any ideas or data, please ship them to data@bobbyportis.com. Rewards for information resulting in restoration or arrests!”
Referring to the Nov. 2 housebreaking, the grievance features a coloration selfie picture of 4 males, one carrying a Chiefs jersey, inside what seems to be a resort room. On the ground is a broken-open protected, together with an array of eight watches, plus a bejeweled watch that one of many suspects, the selfie photographer, is carrying.
The face of 1 particular person is blacked out as a result of the FBI has but to establish him. In a second picture, the selfie photographer prominently shows the watch on his left wrist together with numerous luxurious gadgets arrayed on a mattress. Additionally on the mattress is a yellow crowbar.
That very same housebreaking additionally was notable for the safety digicam video that Portis posted on-line displaying two males on the home’s entrance door, with their heads and faces coated. They hesitate whereas one speaks on a cellphone. Then he says to the opposite in Spanish, “Go for it.” The second kneels and makes use of an influence instrument on a panel close to the bottom of the door.
On Feb. 5, a federal grand jury in Ohio indicted three of the lads in reference to the Nov. 2 housebreaking. “The people appear to be the alleged tip of the iceberg” in a string of crimes, the U.S. Legal professional’s Workplace within the Southern District of Ohio said.
Within the Dec. 19 housebreaking in Memphis, the defendants allegedly netted an estimated $1 million in unidentified gadgets from the house of an individual recognized solely as “Athlete 6.”
The case of the Bengals’ Burrow drew explicit consideration after the housebreaking of his residence on Dec. 9. “My privateness has been violated in additional methods than one,” Burrow advised reporters on the time.
The unsealed grievance, figuring out Burrow solely as “Athlete 5,” listed the worth of things stolen at round $300,000. A few of these gadgets had been recognized just lately at a New York Metropolis pawn store, and each the store proprietor and an worker have been charged with conspiring to obtain stolen property.
In late January, among the suspects had been halted of their Florida rental automotive by police on an Ohio freeway. Physique cam video from the Ohio Freeway Patrol confirmed one of many males carrying a Bengals stocking cap. The boys did not communicate English, so when an officer requested them in Spanish the place they had been headed, they answered, “Orlando.”
“Fallacious course,” the officer responded. An individual within the again seat then modified his vacation spot to New York, then again to Florida. Throughout a search of the automotive, an officer discovered a pouch hidden behind the glove field, and inside had been two instruments that one other officer later recognized as “window punches.” Additionally they discovered a yellow crowbar.
They had been arrested shortly afterward.
Burrow had employed a safety group to patrol his home whereas the Bengals had been in Texas, however the grievance describes the burglars as having tracked not solely the athlete’s actions but additionally these of his residence safety group. The defendants allegedly monitored the occasions when shift adjustments occurred and when the safety personnel would transfer between the front and back of the house.
The grievance describes the burglars as being daring sufficient to stealthily enter the again of the home with out breaking any home windows whereas the safety element was standing within the driveway. The defendants allegedly monitored the element’s actions “from a wooded space the place no safety cameras had been situated,” the grievance states.
The FBI agent describes utilizing quite a few high-tech techniques to zero in on the alleged burglars, together with license-plate reader knowledge from native police at numerous places on the defendants’ routes. Additionally they used cellphone tower knowledge to co-locate a number of defendants’ telephones with their rental automobiles. The identical rental car was recognized as having been in Cincinnati and Jeffersonville, Indiana, earlier than being deserted at a McDonald’s in Miami.
The seven defendants are recognized as Pablo Zuniga Cartes, Ignacio Zuniga Cartes, Bastian Jimenez Freraut, Alexander Huiaguil Chavez, Jordan Quiroga Sanchez, Bastian Orellano Morales and Sergio Ortego Cabello. The latter three, all recognized within the selfie picture launched with the grievance, additionally had been named within the Feb. 5 indictment in Ohio.
ESPN researcher John Mastroberardino contributed to this report.
