Scammer shuffles Apple out of 9,000 iPods

For whatever reason, Apple's iPod ends up in the middle of quite a few crimes. The latest story, however, is even more extreme than usual. Nicholas Arthur Woodhams, a 23 year old from Kalamazoo, Michigan, was recently slapped upside the gord with federal charges of fraud and money laundering after he managed to con Apple into shipping him around 9,000 iPod shuffles. As the story goes, he managed to somehow correctly guess thousands of valid shuffle serial numbers and have replacements shipped to him; once they arrived, he sold them for less than MSRP to excited buyers, all while giving Apple a prepaid VISA number that would reject the charges after he failed to send back the nonexistent "original" shuffle. It's rather amazing to us that he was able to pull this off for so long without being noticed, but even if it works for awhile, we've learned yet again that crime doesn't pay. In fact, the feds have already seized a half million bucks from one brokerage account, some real estate and a trio of vehicles. Tragic, yeah?

[Via Macworld, thanks Steve]

[Steve Miller Posted Mar 22nd 2009 10:05PM]

ok...i have to say it...recession antidote...FAIL.

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 22nd 2009 10:12PM]

Remember reading Encyclopedia Brown as a kid, and how he was able figure out cool shit and get a discount on a TV from the serial number? This guy sure did, makes me wonder if others have done it on higher dollar items.

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 22nd 2009 10:20PM]

Where can i get a juicy fruit ipod!!!?!?!?!?!?!

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 22nd 2009 10:29PM]

Crime DOES pay..ask some people at AIG and half the banks in the country..

[tdburn Posted Mar 23rd 2009 3:18AM]

I would but I'm too busy asking the same question of our elected officials who created the whole mess.

[jimmylittle Posted Mar 22nd 2009 11:08PM]

guessing 9000 serials!?? wow, now Apple is going to stop with sequential serials and switch to DNA profiles of puppies to serialize products.

I wonder if it was the new Shuffle or the old one... it'd be a real shame to do all that work and not get one single button out of the deal...

[technomania Posted Mar 22nd 2009 11:57PM]

Why only shuffles?
Seriously, if you're going to commit fraud anyway, why only ipod shuffles and not the other ipods?!

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 23rd 2009 1:33PM]

Yey our hometown hero!!!
http://www.theboxheads.net/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&p=74579

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 23rd 2009 5:09PM]

LOL, too funny dude. Should have taken all that money and vanished to some on extridictable beach somewhere in the world!

RT
www.online-privacy.pro.tc

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 24th 2009 3:51AM]

WOW 9000 iPod$, I am going to check Ebay and see if I can grab myself a cheap iPod :-)

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[(Unverified) Posted Mar 24th 2009 11:11PM]

At least steal a nano or an iPod Touch. The shuffle is useless