A 19-year-old man from Brooklyn is facing theft charges in connection with a so-called gold bar scam that swindled an 82-year-old Silver Spring woman out of more than $900,000, according to the Montgomery County State’s Attorney’s office.
Zhenyong Weng was arrested Monday in Silver Spring, according to a Montgomery County police press release. Weng was charged with theft of more than $100,000, theft of $25,000 to less than $10, and attempted theft of $25,000 to $100,000, all misdemeanor charges.
He is being held at the county central processing unit in Rockville without bond and is scheduled to face trial Aug. 30 in Montgomery County District Court in Silver Spring, according to court records.
Weng was arrested as he attempted to collect a package from the woman that supposedly contained a gold bar valued at more than $70,000, county police said in a statement. He later admitted that he was to be paid $500 to $1,000 to pick up the package, according to charging documents.
Elizabeth Zoulias, the county’s acting district public defender and Weng’s attorney, did not immediately respond to MoCo360’s request for comment via phone call and email Wednesday afternoon.
With Weng’s arrest, State’s Attorney John McCarthy is warning county residents, especially seniors, not to open pop-up ads on their computers and to hang up on callers who try to convince them to transfer their money or that their finances are in danger.
“Please, please, please hang up on these people, contact the police immediately because we have not caught all of the individuals responsible for these cases,” McCarthy said at a Tuesday press conference after the bond hearing. “The investigation is ongoing.”
McCarthy said the state’s attorney’s office has now identified 19 people across the county who have fallen victim to the scam. He also noted that seniors in the community are disproportionately being targeted and Weng’s arrest marks the third this year by county police of people allegedly involved in such scams.
“The amount of money in these cases is astronomical,” said McCarthy, who noted that he’s talked to residents at senior living facilities in the county including Leisure World of Maryland in Silver Spring about the scam.
Money lost to these schemes is typically untraceable after the scam has been completed, McCarthy said. None of the money lost in the local scams has been recovered.
According to charging documents, the scam allegedly began when the woman received an alert on her computer that criminals had flagged her computer, bank account and Social Security number. The alert directed her to call a phone number on the screen, according to charging documents.
When the woman called the number, an unknown suspect told her that she needed to “secure her money” and that many people had been affected by the problem, documents state. She believed her finances were in danger and followed the caller’s instructions.
On or around April 22, an unknown suspect who went by the name “Tracy” called the woman and directed her to electronically transfer $46,000 to a business “to prevent Russia from stealing” her money from her account, according to court documents. The woman transferred the money to another account where those funds were then stolen.
Unaware that her money had been stolen, the woman continued to follow the suspect’s instructions, and another suspect called “Jeff” contacted her and persuaded her to remove more money from her bank account “to prevent the government from taking her savings while she was waiting to be issued a new Social Security number,” documents state.
The alleged scammers also convinced the woman to purchase gold bars from multiple precious metals dealers. On April 26, she purchased more than $266,940 in gold from a dealer who delivered the bars to her residence on May 2, documents state.
This part of the alleged scheme followed a scenario “fairly similar” to other gold bar scams that made headlines earlier this year called a bait-and-switch method, McCarthy said. In this method, the victim will give gold bars to an unknown courier who steals the gold bars instead of holding them for safekeeping as the victim expects.
In February an “elderly” Leisure World resident was swindled out of more than $700,000 in gold bars. County authorities arrested Wenhui Sun of California in connection to the scheme.
In the Silver Spring case, the women met with a courier who was portraying himself as an “undercover agent” at a Wendy’s restaurant, where he took possession of the gold bars, according to charging documents.
At the direction of the scammers, the woman continued to purchase gold bars and deliver them to a courier, resulting in a combined loss of $900,000.
Charging documents did not say whether Weng was allegedly the courier with whom the woman interacted with was allegedly Weng or a different person.
On June 7, the woman bought 34 gold bars worth more than $2.5 million from a precious metals dealer. The company, Massachusetts-based Coins and Things, arranged for the gold bars to be delivered to her over multiple shipments, documents stated.
Before she had the chance to deliver the bars, the woman became aware that she was being tricked and that her money and gold had been stolen, so she stopped the gold purchases and shipments. Authorities did not share details about how she became aware that she was a victim of the scam.
She then contacted county police who helped her set up a sting operation, McCarthy said at the press conference.
According to the charging documents, the woman continued to communicate with the suspects and led them to believe that the most recent gold shipment had been delayed.
On July 11, Weng allegedly called the woman, who convinced him that a 1-kilogram gold bar (valued at more than $75,000) had arrived at her home. She then arranged for the courier to pick up the bar, according to charging documents.
A few days later, on July 15, the suspect called the woman again and scheduled a pick-up for that day.
According to the charging documents, county police detective Miranda Adami met with Weng, who had approached the woman’s vehicle, stated the code word “watermelon” and removed a package said to contain the gold bar. Weng was then stopped by county detectives who were monitoring the pick-up.
On Tuesday, District Court Judge Aileen Oliver ordered Weng to be held without bond. According to McCarthy, Weng was free on bond in a New York case involving a handgun and had driven from Brooklyn to pick up the gold bars.
He said the judge was “particularly offended by the fact that this case seemed to target a member of our senior community, and she was concerned … that he was a risk to public safety.”
At the press conference, McCarthy said that he did not know if there are connections between the three gold bar scam cases that the county has identified so far this year. He said the investigation is ongoing. In addition, authorities believe the scams usually involve more than one person.
“I know for a fact that senior members of the community are unfortunately targeted. … The No. 1 thing we can do is warn the public. This is a nationwide thing,” McCarthy said.