News Release
U.S. Department of Justice
United States Attorney
District of Rhode Island
March 14, 2008
Three are charged in alleged theft of hospital patients’ identity information
U.S. Secret Service agents today arrested a former security guard at Rhode Island Hospital and the manager of a RadioShack store in Cranston on identity theft charges. A federal complaint alleges that the former guard, Michael Bermudez, stole identity information of emergency room patients and then, with the complicity of the manager, Hector Alvarez, opened cell phone accounts and at least one charge account at the RadioShack store on Garfield Avenue, Cranston.
United States Attorney Robert Clark Corrente and Thomas Powers, Resident Agent in Charge of the Providence Office of the United States Secret Service, jointly announced the complaint, which was filed today in U.S. District Court, Providence.
The complaint names a third defendant, Robert Valerio, who was a clerk at the same RadioShack store and is believed to be in the Dominican Republic.
According to an affidavit supporting the complaint, a patient who had been admitted to Rhode Island Hospital last August was dunned in January by a collection agency seeking payment of an outstanding RadioShack credit card debt of $1,631. The former patient filed a complaint with Cranston Police, stating that he’d never opened the account in question. The patient also learned that a cell phone account had been opened in his name at the Garfield Avenue RadioShack store, and that the phone account had an outstanding balance of $1,353.
Additional investigation by Secret Service agents led to several individuals who had bought what they thought were pre-paid cell phones for $50 each, and that a man named “Mike,” who was a security guard at Rhode Island Hospital, was selling the phones. The phones stopped working about two weeks after the individuals bought them.
Additional investigation led agents to Michael Bermudez. According to the affidavit, since the summer of 2006, Bermudez had been going to the Cranston RadioShack every few weeks with personal information about other individuals. With the assistance of Valerio, Alvarez, or another individual, Bermudez opened cell phone accounts in other persons’ names, activated phones for those accounts, and then offered the phones for sale.
According to the affidavit, Bermudez would often arrive at the store wearing his security guard uniform, with identity information written on slips of paper. A Secret Service agent determined that Bermudez had worked second shift in the Rhode Island Hospital emergency room and had access to all areas of the emergency room. The security guard company fired Bermudez in February for reasons not directly related to the charges filed today.
The complaint charges Bermudez, Alvarez, and Valerio with conspiracy, identity theft, and trafficking in unauthorized access devices. The charges are felonies and therefore subject to review by a federal grand jury. A complaint is merely an allegation
and a defendant is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.
Bermudez, 26, of Regent Avenue, Providence, and Alvarez, 29, of Sisson Street, Providence, appeared today before U.S. Magistrate Judge Lincoln D. Almond. No plea was entered. Almond released Alvarez on unsecured bond. Bond was set for Ramirez also, but he was held because he is wanted in New York for a parole violation.
A warrant has been issued for the arrest of Valerio, 25, formerly of Thackery Street, Providence.
The United States Secret Service and Cranston Police conducted the investigation. Assistant U.S. Attorney Adi Goldstein is prosecuting the case.