Three Round Lake Beach residents are charged with making fake returns worth more than $500,000 to T.J. Maxx, HomeGoods and Marshalls stores across nine states, including one in Morton Grove, police said Wednesday.
Dmitry Voytenko, 22; his sister, Valeria A. Gershanov, 21; and her husband , Vladimir Gershanov, 36 — all of the 1500 block of Cherokee Drive — were arrested Friday in Palatine after a three-month joint investigation led by TJX Companies task force (the parent company of T.J. Maxx) with help from Palatine police and the Cook County Regional Organized Task Force, said Palatine Cmdr. Kurt Schroeder.
During surveillance, investigators spotted the three driving near Roselle and Algonquin roads in Palatine and made the arrest, he said.
They each face forgery charges, and Vladimir Gershanov and Voytenko also face an identity theft charge. Their bail was set at $10,000 Saturday, and they’re due next in court June 8 in Cook County District Court in Rolling Meadows. Additional charges in other states are pending, police said.
Since November, the trio would shoplift items from stores, including a HomeGoods at 7230 W. Dempster St. in Morton Grove, as well as stores in Wisconsin, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, Ohio, New Jersey, Vermont, Texas and Florida, Schroeder said.
They would then return the stolen goods for store credit, and use that store credit to purchase items from other stores, he said. They would also make valid returns for identical items they bought with cash, using those receipts to get additional cash for the shoplifted items, Schroeder said.
The stores estimate a merchandise loss of more than $163,000, he said, while the refunds totaled more than $500,000.
It’s unclear if the three were released on bond, and they could not immediately be reached for comment Wednesday.
You know what's interesting here? If a person is a Keynes fan and believes in Obamanomics, he or she would say that the defendants only "stimulated" the economy. And why not??? All Obama does is stealing from Peter and paying Paul...
It's just that the government can steal legally, and Mr. Voytenko and Co. simply cannot....
