Couple allegedly bilked $20K from victims during one week
CITY HALL — A couple has been arrested and charged in a mail fraud scheme that used a rented Santa Monica mailbox to allegedly bilk hundreds of thousands of dollars in payments from victims.
Maciej Noworyta and Brenda Chaidezdiaz were arrested at their Chino Hills home on Friday, Dec. 2, and taken to Los Angeles County Jail after the Santa Monica City Attorney’s Office filed a 30-count criminal complaint against the couple charging them with conspiracy, grand theft and false advertising.
The complaint is based on evidence which suggests at least hundreds of victims paid $20 each to sign up for work stuffing envelopes at home. Noworyta and Chaidezdiaz have been accused of sending out false advertising to induce victims to send the $20 to secure employment and then providing them with nothing more than worthless documents, according to the City Attorney’s Office.
It’s alleged the couple used a mailbox at the UPS Store at 1223 Wilshire Boulevard in Santa Monica to receive payments. According to the allegations, the couple was able to obtain hundreds of thousands of dollars per year for several years from victims. In a one-week period in October, the defendants’ Santa Monica mailbox received more than $20,000 in payments from more than 1,200 victims around the country.
If convicted, Noworyta and Chaidez-diaz face up to 22 years in jail and $45,000 in fines each.
Last week, Noworyta and Chaidezdiaz were released on $200,000 combined bail. As conditions of their release, Noworyta and Chaidezdiaz had to surrender their passports, were ordered to remain in Southern California and were prohibited from selling their real estate or motor vehicles, according to Adam Radinsky, deputy city attorney.
“Consumers should always be wary of so-called employment offers that require them to pay any money,” Radinsky said. “If you’re working for them, they should only be paying you.”
Radinsky also warned that all solicitations – whether by mail, telephone, or e-mail – should be treated with healthy skepticism.
“If they contact you, and not the other way around, be very careful,” Radinsky said.
Jerry Kaplan, attorney for the couple, said there’s no question that Noworyta and Chaidezdiaz had a mail-order business. However, to his mind, the issue of whether or not advertising associated with that mail-order business was intended to misrepresent the services it offered would be a key issue hashed out in court.
If convicted, Noworyta’s and Chaidez-diaz’s penalties could include one year in jail and a $2,700 fine for each of the 14 counts of grand theft; six months in jail and a $6,500 fine for each of the 14 false advertising counts; and up to one year in jail and $2,700 in fines for each of the two counts of conspiracy.
Radinsky said the City Attorney’s Office became involved in the case after receiving at least three different complaints from victims of the alleged scam, beginning in September. Shortly after, the City Attorney’s Office was contacted by federal investigators, who had begun their own investigation, Radinsky said.
The couple is alleged to have operated under a number of different names, including: Mayflower Publishing; Executive Publications; Ad-Ventures International; and Tri-Star Publishing. Both the City Attorney’s Office and federal investigators are continuing to search for additional victims who may have made payments over the past year.
A pretrial conference is scheduled for Jan. 26 at the Los Angeles Airport Courthouse. No trial date has been set.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on December 13, 2005. Read the original PDF.