Venezuelan national arrested in sting in Marengo

MARENGO — A Venezuelan man was arrested in Marengo after helping scam a woman out of $24,000.

According to court documents filed March 11 in Iowa County District Court, a woman who identified herself as Melissa Solyoak convinced a Marengo woman, that she was an agent of the Federal Government. On Feb. 28, as instructed by Solyoak, the woman gave $24,000 to Armando Jose Guedez Daher, 32, of Austin, Texas, who was posing as an undercover federal agent.

On March 10, Solyoak instructed the Marengo woman to give Daher, another $20,000. Daher picked up the money at Smith’s house and was arrested as he drove away, according to court documents filed by the Iowa County Sheriff’s Department.

Daher was charged March 11 with theft in the first degree against an older person (someone 60 or older), a Class B felony; theft in the first degree, a Class C felony; and conspiracy to commit non-forceable felony, a Class D felony.

Bond was set at $75,000.

Iowa County Chief Deputy Todd Sauerbrei said he’s been in touch with the FBI and that Immigration and Customs Enforcement has a detainer on Daher, who is from Venezuela.

The victim didn’t report the scam until after she delivered the money. The cash is not recoverable, said Sauerbrei.

“In a lot of these scams, once the victim has been scammed once, they want some more out of them,” said Sauerbrei. “We decided to set up a sting to see if these people would come back for more money, which they did.

“It’s a very organized criminal network. We don’t know where the scammer really is. … but they have to have folks like the one we arrested.”

Scams take many different forms, said Sauerbrei. There are a lot of ways people can lie to victims.

“This started as, basically, a cyberattack,” said Sauerbrei. The computer locks up and a phone number appears on the screen. “If your computer’s locked up and you don’t know how to fix it, they kind of have you on the hook.”

When the victim calls the number, a person pretends to be a federal agent who will put the victim in touch with someone who can fix the computer.

“You think it’s a regular business,” said Sauerbrei. It sounds legitimate.

“It’s a very sophisticated network of people out to steal your money.”

Sometimes victims are asked to send the money by bitcoin or gift cards. “These particular groups of scammers, they’re going around picking up cash from folks.

Bitcoin is a big scam tool. “We have a lot of people fall for bitcoin,” said Sauerbrei. Money in a bitcoin can go anywhere in the world, as can a money gram.

Though investigators attempt to find out where the money ends up, it’s rarely recovered.

“Once the money’s gone, its gone,” said Sauerbrei.

Scammers use different stories to convince people to send them money and to convince people not to tell anyone about it, said Sauerbrei. They might say a relative has been arrested and needs a bond agent or that the victim is accused of embezzling money and needs to pay to get the charges dropped.

The scammer may even promise to send the money back after everything is set right.

“The scammers are very smart. They tell these folks they can’t tell anyone,” said Sauerbrei. They might tell victims they’ll be criminally prosecuted.

“A lot of it is, people don’t want to be embarrassed,” Sauerbrei said. Because of that, many people don’t report falling for scams.

“We don’t want people to be afraid to call us,” said Sauerbrei.

“No one’s out of their reach with technology,” said Sauerbrei. Even in small towns such as Marengo.

Scammers have ways to manipulate voices, and they’ve become more realistic with AI.

“It’s frustrating and its complicated.”

Sauerbrei suggests verifying independently what people say, and ask, “does this make sense?”

And if an offer sounds too good to be true, it is, said Sauerbrei.