Some months ago it was reported that numerous amount of cell phones were stolen from a Claro Warehouse, among the phones stolen were a large number of Blackberry Bold 9000 Smart-phone Devices, the indecent was being investigated by the relevant authorities unknowing to the public. As time would have it a few months later these phones had resurfaced on the market and were being sold to unsuspecting buyers as new but ‘Branded to Claro’, when asked where the phones were sourced, many were told by a cooperate Claro Link or From a Claro Dealer, being that these phones were passed down to many different re-sellers it is possible that a large number of them had no idea they were stolen, but one still has to ask if these re-sellers had suspicions.

The persons who bought the Blackberry devices for way less than the actual value soon ran into problems as after activating their Blackberry data plan many experienced a loss in service a few weeks down the road, when they contacted their respective service providers they were advised that these devices were stolen and subsequently had to be barred from using the Blackberry Data Services. The exact amount of Blackberry Phones that went down is somewhere in the 100+ region, so as you would imagine many persons were calling the sellers asking for refunds, which to many would lead to a dead end.

An Article was posted on the Jamaican Star Website with regards to the incident.

Three men charged in connection with the theft of 120 Blackberry phones from Claro, are to face trial in November for the charge of receiving stolen property.

Charged are Michael Manning, 29, an operations network manager at Claro, Romico Slack, 24, an IP and Data Engineer also employed to Claro and 25-year-old Ricardo Bedwood,a banker employed to the National Commercial Bank.

The men appeared in the Corporate Area Resident Magistrate’s Court on Monday and a trial date of November 24 was agreed on.

The allegations are that, between June and August, 120 Blackberry phones were stolen from the Claro warehouse. Manning was subsequently found with one of the stolen phones. When questioned, he reportedly told the police he bought the phone from Slack. Slack reportedly admitted he had sold the phone to Manning, but told the police, he had bought the phone from Bedward.

When the police arrested Bedward, he claimed he had bought the phone from a man he met through a friend. When this man was contacted, he said he had not sold Bedward any phones, and instead said he had been sold phones in the past by Bedward.

The men are due to return to court on the trial date.

Something like this is very unfortunate as it affects allot of people directly and indirectly, and one can only hope that proper justice will be served to the unscrupulous persons behind these selfish and dirty crime.