United States Attorney Richard B. Roper
Northern District of Texas

FORT WORTH, TEXAS, MAN SENTENCED TO MORE THAN EIGHT YEARS
IN FEDERAL PRISON, WITHOUT PAROLE, FOR INVOLVEMENT
IN ORGANIZED RETAIL THEFT RING

FORT WORTH, Tx. — Raid Saif, a/k/a “Mike,” was sentenced by U.S. District Judge John McBryde to 97 months in prison and ordered to pay $12,500 restitution. In addition, Saif, 32, who is in the United States illegally, will be deported to Kuwait as a condition of his supervised release.

Saif pled guilty in May to one count of possession of goods stolen from interstate shipment. According to documents filed in Court, approximately $900,000 worth of Viagra® sildenafil citrate tablets, a prescription drug, ordered from Pfizer, Inc. by the Department of Veterans Affairs, were manufactured by Pfizer, Inc. in Puerto Rico and then shipped to a regional warehouse in Memphis, Tennessee. They were then shipped to the AmerisourceBergen Corp. distribution warehouse in Grand Prairie, Texas, where they were stolen in a burglary on January 1, 2003.

“This significant prison sentence ends a chapter in a major retail theft ring which organized a few to defraud and steal from many,” said John Chakwin Jr., Special Agent in Charge of the ICE Office of Investigations in Dallas. “ICE partnered with a number of locally based law enforcement agencies to end this crime spree.” Chakwin’s area of responsibility includes north Texas and the state of Oklahoma.

A man named Erics Green-Troupe had two cases containing 9600 of the stolen Viagra® sildenafil citrate tablets that he wished to sell. On January 7, 2003, Green-Troupe, and Saif, drove to Sunshine Market, a convenience store in Arlington, Texas, owned by Mohammed Ghali. While Green-Troupe waited outside, Saif went into the store and negotiated the sale of the 9600 Viagra® tablets to Ghali. Saif then carried the cases into the store and left with several thousand dollars cash from Ghali, paid Green-Troupe and kept a commission for brokering the deal.

Saif also admitted in Court documents that on September 9, 2004, he gave an individual, who was cooperating with the government, two 30-count, 100 milligram containers of sildenafil,a prescription drug, which Saif represented to be authentic Viagra® tablets, telling that individual that he had 17 cases of the same product for sale. However, as Saif well knew, the product he gave to the individual was counterfeit.

Mohammed Ghali was sentenced in February 2005 to 14 years in federal prison after being convicted at trial of various federal felony violations relating to organized retail theft in North Texas. He was also ordered to forfeit more than $4 million in cash and two residences in Arlington, Texas. Erics Green-Troupe pled guilty in August 2003 to one count of possession of goods stolen from interstate shipment and was sentenced in November 2003 to three years probation.

During Mohammed Ghali’s trial in 2004, the government presented evidence that Ghali, his co-defendants, and their co-conspirators, including other owners and operators of convenience stores in and around Fort Worth, advertised by word of mouth that the Ghali organization would pay cash for certain property, including infant formula, pharmaceuticals, cigarettes, health and beauty aids, medicinal products, glucose test strips, nicotine gum and transdermal patches, razors and razor blades. Encouraged by this, thieves would shoplift or steal up to $2000 worth of property per day from retail stores and supermarkets. Members of Ghali’s organization even assisted some of the thieves by providing vehicles and, in the event they were arrested, they would provide bail money.

In fact, Ghali, at his trial, was also convicted on a count of theft from interstate shipment for selling 1600 of the stolen Viagra® tablets obtained from Saif to a government witness on January 10, 2003.

U.S. Attorney Roper praised the outstanding investigative efforts of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Fort Worth Police Department, and the Food and Drug Administration - Office of Criminal Investigation. The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Joseph Revesz.

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