Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, February 11, 1995 TAG: 9502130033
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: PORTLAND, ORE. LENGTH: Medium
Karen Smith didn't notice her bank card was missing until her credit union telephoned to tell her that her account was more than $346,000 overdrawn.
Two men and a woman now face charges they used the card to make 724 withdrawals over 54 hours in what authorities say was one of the five largest automated teller fraud cases in U.S. history. A fourth person is being sought.
For the thieves, it was like hitting the jackpot on a slot machine - over and over and over.
They cruised from one automated teller machine to another in a maroon, gold-trimmed Cadillac, spending hours at a time withdrawing money, police said.
``They did it just as fast as you could punch in the card, punch in the number and pull out the card, time and time again, many, many consecutive withdrawals,'' Gresham police detective Jim Muzyn said.
To safeguard against this sort of thing, the machines are supposed to give no more than $200 per day on any single card. But because of a computer software change at Oregon TelCo Credit Union, the limit wasn't in effect that weekend.
By the time the thieves finished, they'd withdrawn $346,770 from 48 bank machines.
``They drained a couple of them dry,'' Secret Service agent James Cline said.
When the account became empty, it was no problem. They used empty envelopes to make five phony deposits totaling $820,500.
It began on a Friday night, Nov. 18, when Smith left her van locked in a parking lot while she attended a high school football game in Gresham, a Portland suburb. Someone broke into the van, went through Smith's purse and stole the bank card. She had written the card's personal identification number on her Social Security card.
The card was used moments after it was stolen, at a bank machine just a few blocks from the football field. Investigators used bank machine records to trace the thieves' route more than 100 miles through five counties.
But five of the machines had hidden cameras that captured the thieves' pictures.
From the photos, David Gallagher and his wife, Terry, both 40, became suspects almost immediately. Gallagher has 21 felony convictions, assistant U.S. Attorney Lance Caldwell said. On Tuesday morning, investigators arrested the Gallaghers and the owner of the Cadillac, Danny Ballow, 47.
The three each face up to five years in prison on federal charges of unauthorized use of an access device.
Police said they found $30,000 in the suspects' homes. Muzyn wouldn't say what he thinks happened to the rest of the money.
Smith isn't liable for the theft.
by CNB