Third Man Arrested in Target Theft Ring

Chance Cameron, of Allentown, was the third man arrested for his alleged involvement in a sophisticated theft ring, in which suspects are accused of affixing lower-priced UPC labels to higher-priced products to defraud Target stores and selling the products online for profit, according to the Montgomery County District Attorney's office.

Cameron's arrest was announced when one of the other defendants in "Operation Hard Target," Eugene Joseph Romano of Center Valley, Pa., appeared in a Montgomery County court room last week.  

According to a complaint filed in District Court 38-1-03, Romano 34, and Cameron, 35, have been charged along with Damian Gasdaska of Phillipsburg, NJ, with committing 46 individual retail thefts at Target Stores in 11 Pennsylvania counties between between February and July of 2011.

Several of the incidents occured at the Targets in Cheltenham Township and Plymouth Township.

The complaint states that the men created UPC labels that identified lower-priced items and affixed them to high-priced items of the same brand at Target stores, defrauding Target stores of more than $20,000.

The men are also accused of fraudulently creating eBay, Paypal and PNC bank accounts to sell the items online, yielding a profit of $172,000. The three men allegedly committed identity theft, stealing driver's license numbers of several residents throughout the country, including a Conshohocken man.

Gasdaska, 35, is also accused of laundering the proceeds into a personal Bank of America checking account using Walmart "Money Gram" money orders.

A photo of Cameron was released as a third unknown suspect when Romano and Gasdaska were arrested in November of last year. Police received multiple anonymous tips as to Cameron's whereabouts, and the additional arrest was made.

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