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6 held as int'l. credit scam is detected in U. Darby

Six people allegedly involved in an international credit-card-scam ring are now behind bars on $500,000 bail each and under investigation by the Secret Service after police found their booty strewn across beds in an Upper Darby motel Friday.

Six people allegedly involved in an international credit-card-scam ring are now behind bars on $500,000 bail each and under investigation by the Secret Service after police found their booty strewn across beds in an Upper Darby motel Friday.

A woman in Pasadena, Calif., was stumped when she checked her credit-card account Friday and realized it had just been used to rent two rooms at the Summit Motor Inn on Township Line Road, Upper Darby Police Superintendent Michael Chitwood said.

Responding officers discovered that even though the woman still had her card, someone had used her account to rent two rooms at the motel.

When officers entered those rooms, they discovered about 72 gift cards and credit cards all over the beds; a credit-card skimmer, which records information from a card's magnetic strip; three computers, and $1,700 in cash, Chitwood said.

The ring somehow gains access to the magnetic strip on the back of a credit card without ever stealing the card, police said.

The information is then uploaded onto altered credit cards, and even onto gift cards for stores including Kmart and Macy's, Chitwood said.

"I don't have an explanation for the intricate nature of what they do," he said. "The sophistication boggles my mind."

Police said the California victim's stolen information was routed to Canada before it was sent to a group in Ohio.

Three of those arrested Friday - Marian Abrokwa, 18; Diamond Dabo, 33; and Emmanuel Wiafe, 24 - are from Ohio and are believed to have direct ties to the Ohio-based ring, Chitwood said.

Three others - Noah Dobson, 33, of Sharon Hill; Issiajh Bah, 34, of Upper Darby; and Varflay Sekou Kanneh, 30, of Philadelphia - are believed to be "low-level thieves" who are hired out in various locations across the country to use the cards at local stores, Chitwood said.

After buying the merchandise, it's believed the "low-level thieves" turn it over to those directly tied to the organization, and they are given compensation for their effort, police said.

The Summit Motor Inn was most likely the "hub" where they were planning to set up shop for a few days while the cards were being used, police said.

Of the 72 gift and credit cards found Friday, 47 have been determined to be altered, Chitwood said.

The Secret Service, an arm of the Treasury Department whose Financial Crimes Division investigates credit-card fraud, is expected to take over the case.

Until then, all six of those allegedly involved are being held in the Delaware County Prison on $500,000 cash bail each, on charges of identity theft, possessing instruments of a crime and related offenses.