South Orange man sentenced to 21 months in prison for fraud

NEWARK, NJ — Alexander Varice, 27, of South Orange, was sentenced Oct. 5 to 21 months in prison for his role in a conspiracy to defraud two banks out of more than $250,000 using stolen credit cards and blank checks, acting U.S. Attorney Rachael A. Honig announced.

Varice’s conspirators, Allen Varice, 25, of East Orange; Dashawn Duncan, 27, of South Orange; Nasheed Jackson, 24, of Newark; Qshaun Brown-Guinyard, 27, Newark; and Tamir Duval, 22, of Newark, previously pleaded guilty by video before U.S. District Judge Susan D. Wigenton to informations charging each with one count of conspiracy to commit bank fraud. Wigenton imposed the sentence on Varice via video conference. Duncan, Jackson, Brown-Guinyard and Allen Varice have been sentenced by Wigenton; Duval is scheduled to be sentenced in December.

According to documents filed in this case and statements made in court, from August 2018 through January 2020, Varice, Jackson and Duncan engaged in a scheme to use stolen credit cards or checks to fraudulently make purchases and withdraw money from two banks. The credit cards were stolen from facilities used by the U.S. Postal Service in Pine Brook and Warren, and never reached the intended cardholders. After obtaining the stolen cards, Varice, Jackson and Duncan used them to make unauthorized purchases at various retail stores and to withdraw cash from ATMs in New Jersey and elsewhere. The blank checks were also stolen from various New Jersey–based post office facilities, and never reached their intended recipients. Varice and Jackson altered the date, payee and amount of the stolen checks prior to deposit into a third-party account so that they could manually enter the amounts that they wanted to fraudulently withdraw from a victim bank ATM.

  Fraud, Sentencing, U.S. Attorney’s Office, U.S. Postal Service