LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WAVE) – Kroger at St. Matthews caught another suspect red-handed allegedly replacing gift cards for purchases with fake cards.
Shortly after 6 p.m. Thursday, St. Matthews police responded to a report of gift card tampering at Kroger on Hubbards Lane. They found Zunxing Chen, 51, of Monterey Park, Calif., in the parking lot. Kroger’s anti-theft department claimed Chen was caught on surveillance video placing six tampered Sephora gift cards on a shelf for purchase.
When police arrested Chen, they found in his possession a backpack containing 1,127 gift cards from various stores. Where the gift cards came from is unclear, and police do not yet know how many of them may have been counterfeit.
The police report states that Chen is “suspected of being part of a group that defrauds customers at Kroger and several other stores across the country.”
“This is happening all over the country,” said St. Matthews Police Chief Barry Wilkerson. “These are Chinese nationalists who are altering the gift cards in a certain way. When you pay for a gift card from a certain company, the money is automatically deposited into an account.”
Thursday’s incident was not Wilkerson’s first run-in with alleged gift card scammers. In May, SMPD arrested another suspect for the same alleged crime at the same Kroger on Hubbards Lane. That suspect had about a tenth of the number of gift cards Chen allegedly possessed.
WAVE attempted to reach the Louisville Kroger district office for comment but was unable to reach anyone.
An NBC affiliate in California reported on a similar alleged plot in Sacramento in February of this year. The suspect was caught allegedly defrauding Target customers. Police later found 5,000 gift cards in the trunk of his car. An FBI agent linked the case to an “international plot” but did not name a specific country as the main perpetrator.
Wilkerson says he has made several attempts to contact the Chinese consulate about his case, but has not received a response.
Ultimately, Wilkerson emphasizes that customers play a key role in preventing this phenomenon.
“People need to stay alert,” Wilkerson said. “Be sure to check the cards. If they look tampered with in any way, tell the seller. Use a different one. Just be careful when buying gift cards. Scams happen.”
Wilkerson hopes federal authorities will get involved in St. Matthews’ cases. He said he will contact the Department of Homeland Security.
“I’m hoping that we can tie some of these things together and find out who they are and if there’s any connection to other groups that are doing this,” Wilkerson explained. “It would be nice to put it all together and put it in a nice package. That way we can get more clues about how we might be able to prevent this or who we can turn to to maybe prevent this.”
WAVE reached out to DHS for comment but did not receive a response prior to publication.
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