| For Immediate Release Case # 10HF0734
|
FOUR UNEMPLOYED MEN CHARGED WITH
YEAR-LONG ATM THEFT CONSPIRACY USING
STOLEN TRUCKS AND FORKLIFT
NEWPORT BEACH – Additional charges were filed today against four unemployed men involved in a $400,000 conspiracy to steal Automated Teller Machines (ATM) using two stolen trucks and a stolen forklift. Richard Dwayne Bockman, 43, Yucca Valley, Ricky Joe Coffey, 44, Orange, Curtis Edward Weber, 38, Anaheim, and Charles Earl Roberts, 41, Riverside, are scheduled to be arraigned on the charges this morning, Thursday, June 24, 2010, in Department H-2, Harbor Justice Center, Newport Beach.
All four defendants are being held on $1 million bail. Prior to posting bond, the defendants must prove that their bail money is from a legal and legitimate source.
All four defendants are charged with four felony counts of grand theft, two felony counts each of arson, commercial burglary, and vandalism, and one felony count each of conspiracy to commit an unlawful taking of a motor vehicle, conspiracy to commit grand theft, conspiracy to commit arson, and the unlawful taking of a motor vehicle. They all face sentencing enhancements for causing over $200,000 in loss.
If convicted, Roberts faces a maximum sentence of 15 years and eight months in state prison.
As to the unlawful taking of a motor vehicle charge, Coffey faces sentencing enhancements and allegations for having a prior in 1994 for the same charge. Coffey also faces sentencing enhancements and allegations for being convicted and sent to prison on two separate occasions and not remaining free for a period of five years for a 1994 conviction for possession of stolen property and a 2005 conviction for identity theft. He faces an additional sentencing enhancement for crime-bail-crime, meaning that he was out of custody on bail on another criminal case at the time of this crime. Coffey faces a maximum sentence of 21 years and eight months in state prison if convicted.
Bockman faces additional felony charges including one count each of attempted grand theft, vandalism and the unlawful taking of a motor vehicle. Bockman faces sentencing enhancements and allegations for being convicted and sent to prison on six separate occasions and not remaining free for five years for 1992 and 1996 unlawful taking of a motor vehicle convictions, transportation of methamphetamine in 1995, possession of substances to manufacture drugs in 1999, and possession of methamphetamine and possession of stolen property in 2005. He faces an additional sentencing enhancement for crime-bail-crime. If convicted, Bockman faces a maximum sentence of 26 years and eight months in state prison.
Weber faces an additional felony charge for the possession of methamphetamine for sale. As to that charge, he faces sentencing enhancements and allegations for a prior conviction for possession of methamphetamine for sale in 2004.