Stolen Credit Cards Numbers Lands Houston Man In Federal Prison

HOUSTON – Ninh Nguyen, 58, of Houston, has been ordered to prison following his conviction of access device fraud, United States Attorney Kenneth Magidson announced today. Nguyen pleaded guilty Oct. 4, 2012, admitting he possessed 15 or more credit card account numbers that had been stolen or obtained with intent to defraud.

Today, U.S. District Judge Gray H. Miller, who accepted the guilty plea, handed Nguyen a 48-month sentence followed by three years of supervised release. At the hearing today, additional evidence was presented proving that Nguyen continued to engage in access device fraud in Arizona while released on bond.  

Nguyen was arrested March 30, 2012, at the Wal-Mart on Tomball Parkway by the Harris County Sheriff’s Department for shoplifting 32 Wal-Mart gift cards. Court records indicated he was detained and subsequently found to be in possession of more than 250 credit, debit and other gift cards. Many of the cards were in Nguyen’s name, but some were in his wife’s name and in the names of others. 

All of the cards were analyzed and 27 were found to have magnetic strips encoded with numbers and accountholder information that did not match the number or name on the front of the card. The true accountholders for the 27 re-encoded cards were contacted and all stated that they had not given Nguyen permission to possess their card numbers or to re-encode them onto credit, debit or gift cards.

Although originally released on bond following his arrest in 2012, Nguyen was taken into federal custody on March 1, 2013, for violating his conditions of release.

The matter was investigated by the United States Secret Service and the Harris County Sheriff’s Department and is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney James R. Buchanan.