Van Nuys Man Awaits Trial in ‘Clip-On’ Phone Scam

SIMI VALLEY —  Maximo Pintle Cruz has been locked up in the Ventura County Jail for a month for allegedly helping people reach out and touch someone.

The problem, prosecutors allege, is that the people he was helping had no telephones, and his help came in the form of illegally tapping into Pacific Bell phone lines and selling cut-rate phone service.

Cruz, who is awaiting trial on two charges of telephone fraud, was arrested in late December after a Simi Valley police officer noticed people lining up to make calls at a pay phone.

The 25-year-old Van Nuys man is believed to be the first person arrested in Ventura County on suspicion of performing the so-called “clip-on” fraud, said Mark Yelchak, a fraud investigator for Pacific Bell.

The scam, which has swept through California in the last year, involves breaking into telephone boxes and tapping into business phone lines and then selling long-distance service either on the spot or transferring the line to a nearby phone booth and selling the service there, Yelchak said.

The victim businesses often end up with huge phone bills, officials said, and the scam artists are long gone by the time the fraud is discovered.

Prosecutors believe that Cruz twice broke into phone boxes--also known as “b-boxes”-- outside of businesses in Simi Valley and then sold long-distance service to people on the street, said Deputy Dist. Atty. David Lehr.

Lehr would not comment on details of the case but said that Cruz pleaded not guilty to the phone fraud charges earlier this month and is scheduled to have a preliminary hearing next week.

The Simi Valley Police Department was tight-lipped about the case, only saying that detectives are still investigating.

Officials said that breaking into phone boxes and tapping into business lines are only the latest twists in telephone fraud enterprises that also include pirating cellular phone numbers and stealing phone credit card access numbers.

“They are usually working on off hours, breaking into the boxes and physically hooking up a phone line on the spot or stringing it to a mobile phone,” said Gary Sanderson, a spokesman for Pacific Bell.

The quick-hit artist can rack up some enormous bills for the business, Sanderson said, calling countries in Europe, Asia, Africa and Central and South America. One nonprofit group in Los Angeles hit last fall had more than $30,000 in long-distance bills.

“The best form of detection is when you have someone just reporting that they saw something that looks weird, like people lining up at a phone booth,” Sanderson said. “And, of course, if you look over your bill you can say, ‘Hey, I know I didn’t call Lower Saxony.’ ”

Although at one point during the last 12 months Pacific Bell officials estimated they were seeing 10 to 15 new clip-on fraud cases a month, Sanderson said the scam has died down as more of the scam artists are caught and prosecuted.