The Times has an intriguing story on Shiva Brent Sharma, an Indo-Trinidadian from Richmond Hill, Queens. At the age of 20, he was convicted three times for identity theft, and he was the first person to be indicted under New York state’s special identity theft law.
Sharma was studying at Brooklyn Tech when he started to get interested in making money through identity theft. He learned the ropes of it through hacker sites, and started sending out “phishing” emails to thousands of AOL users to secure banking and credit card information via spoof websites. He used the money to buy cars and car parts, and stayed at upscale hotels in New York before he got caught. No one knows for sure how much he stole, but it’s in the range of $150,000.
Sharma made quite a number of illegal purchases almost immediately after being released on bail for an earlier infringement. Sharma is also married to a woman he met in high school, and has a kid; he only graduated high school in Rikers Island prison.
From the Times article, it’s hard to figure Sharma out. What made him do it? Drugs, gambling, a need to impress? Not necessarily any of the above:
Back at the correctional facility, Mr. Sharma struggled to find a clear explanation for his crimes. At times he suggested he was taking aim at a usurious banking industry. At other moments he offered that it was simply a game, that he was young, that he was not thinking clearly.
“Well, you know — I mean there’s no, there’s no justification behind it at all,” he said. “You know it was wrong, and I did it — it was wrong.”
He also suggested it all became too easy too fast.
“The challenge was really stopping, you know?” he said. “That was the hardest challenge of them all.” (link)
In short, no answers. Either he’s hiding something from the reporter, or he’s simply unable to understand his actions. But that’s life, isn’t it: you can’t always wrap up a criminal’s psychology from a couple of easy biographical details like they do on the television crime dramas.
Maybe Marvel Comics is onto something with their idea of a “Cyberpath” named Black Box (aka Commcast).
Drugs?? gambling?? It was all about money and thats it. This issue hits close to home as I know somebody who recently got deported back to India for this. I used to always be surprised at how this guy used to spend money buying houses (mansions), cars (s600), clothes etc and he didnt even have a job. now he is probably doing kheti in Jalandhar
The dude should have read my previous post before his crimes 🙂
is it really hard to understand? I must say of all the things people do in our world, this one doesn’t surprise me a whole lot. I’m surprised more people don’t do it. $150,000 isn’t sofa-cushion change, and hacking can be pretty addictive, adreneline-rich activity.
Shitbags exist in every race, creed, color, religion, etc….
I was scammed by a desi uncle in Chicago while in school there for a couple of years. The uncle was near the University bookstore, dressed in a suit, nice shoes, overcoat, etc. at an odd hour and claimed he was a doctor at Mercy hospital. His luggage/handbag that had his identification was lost in transit. He came to Downtown to his bank to draw some money, but since his ID was in his luggage, he couldn’t get money.
He asked for some cash to get to Mercy hospital in a cab. Not only that, he busted out in Guju and seemed like a good guy all in all. He played on my browness and I gave him money (funny thing is, I wouldn’t have done this in India, but all uncles are nice in the US, right?) Dirtbag gave me a phone number to Mercy and I called a week later to get the money I loaned him back (since he ‘borrowed’ it). He never worked there or existed.
Anyway, I was duped. Luck was on my side though. A month later, same dude shows up and trys to scam a friend of mine who was leaving with her date for dinner. She called me up. I called the University Cops and we ambushed the douchebag. When the cops checked his wallet, they found a STACK of horse track gambling receipts.
Further investigations found that he was working with a buddy conning local desis. My friend and I went to court. Since the dude didn’t show up, an automatic warrant was laid down. Cops were really supportive and they didn’t like students getting conned.
Since I was the ISA Vice President, I sent out a mass email detailing these events. I got about 10 replies mentioning the same people had swindled them, too. Even a nice ol professor was had. Can’t let your guard down. You may not see the warning signs (which in hindsight there were many).
Another chink in the model minority armor…
Sonia, I guess I find this guy especially hard to read because he’s totally blank. I expected some kind of sob story back there — childhood poverty, getting beat up on the playground, … something. But this guy just seems to like taking people’s money.
GujuDude, that’s an interesting story. I feel like people have told similar stories on SM; there was a blogger from Toronto who got mugged in a scam like this… I forget his name… Anyway, was this ever covered in the paper at all?
The local school paper had blurb on it, all in all, not much coverage. I sent emails to other South Asian organizations from the other local colleges giving them a heads up. Comments came from one school where these guys had operated at.
The judge was a total ass. The police, witnesses (my friend, I, and emails from ISA replies) were all for prosecuting and the DA was willing to press charges. The Judge: “Well you gave money willingly, no one forced you to give it”. Thankfully, him NOT showing up forced an automatic warrant and bail set for a grand, or something.
Getting the word out via the email list (I had about 1000 people on it) was probably the most publicity I could have got. However, since the demographic zeroed in by these dudes was desi, people who needed to know eventually found out via emails or word of mouth.
that “blank” look probably stems from the “i should NOT be in this fucking place. it’s all a BIG MISTAKE” mentality that everyone in prison seems to have, in denial of or being unable to process the guilt and retribution associated with crimes they most definitely committed. in fact, if they were capable of this and related emotions in the first place, they probably would have had enough good sense to not find their way into the clink. remorse doesn’t happen overnight.
i spent less than a month in prison (a far cry from “2 to 4”), but it was still a horrible, soul-wrenching experience. at least for me. thankfully, no physical harm came my way (part was spent in work release and the other in medium-security). the day i was released, i went with my friends to a club where we got drunk, got high and were up to the usual no good, like fools. of course on the way TO prison i was bawling and sorry for all the world’s sins.
i still know people who are now out, after having served 2 to 5 at Rikers, who live with the very real possibility that they just as well go back (to prison) one day – without batting an eye. they just don’t care.. you know, because it like, “comes with the turf” and all.
sigh
What were you in for AC?
A promising movie plot is forming in my mind.
Title: Ho Sake to Pakad Lo Cast: Salman Khan (Sharma), Soha Ali Khan(his wife) ,Amitabh Bachchan (DA – who else?) Rest: Does not matter.
M. Nam
This guy was on local TV a while back. I know a pakistani dude that sat at home and funded his lavish lifestyle for a good 6 years before he got caught on bank fraud. This was in the days of AOL 1.5 so there were a lot of gullible people out there. He’d apparently steal personal information and get credit cards from them. Identity theft. He spent 2 1/2 years at a federal pen in Virginia. The draw is the money. Plain and simple.
“Another chink in the model minority armor…”
Actually, I think he seems to be of South Asian descent….
No no that was just a joke, but I wonder. I was born in the late 70s… and growing up, the worst thing I heard of an Indian doing was not making the “best student” section of India Abroad. Of course, most of the prison elements are not directly from the homeland, rather via the indentured servitude colonies, (fiji, british columbia, guyana, etc..) that find their way through the penal system. And yes, I’m aware theres a more accurate cross section of Indian/South asian populace from the ex-Brit colonies, rather than a state selected immigrant pool consisting of folks with higher degrees, etc..
But I’ve often had this hypothesis, since your average whitemanjack doesn’t think “oh he’s from a country previously held by the british, and migrated through indentured servitude, and not directly from the subcontinent” even though some of us might.
But seeing brown folks, as it were, committing and getting punished for petty crimes, actually humanizes us in a way. It takes us out of these far extreme categories like, “super smart at spelling and math, sit down and take orders from bill gates” type and the “turban wearing, beard having, allah akbar terrorist” type.
You kill me HMF! Let’s leave our emotionally charged racial terms at the door shall we? 😉 Loved the joke. I totally agree with your view that we should all consider the humanity of being “brown/sepia/etc.”
Oh man talk about wierd desi people who may/may not being trying to scam you… I had an odd encounter not more than a few hours back. I can’t even summarize the story because it was all so wierd…. but I’ll just trim up the gmail convo I had with my friend telling her about the girl…
Basically, I met what was either someone who was slightly crazy, or was trying to scam on me. Some desi chick from Delhi. She was severely wierding me out. I took the train today from a different station (metropark) than my normal one (dunellen). This girl caught my eye because she half-looked like she was going yachting. I go to sit down on this empty bench. She comes and sits down right next to me, and says, “I like your mehndi.” Ok, but my mehndi’s half worn off, and is on my left hand which was on the other side of her, and my hand was all curled around my rolly-bag handle. You could only see 2 inches of it, yet she really liked it… Then she quickly followed with, “Aap india se ho?” (“Are you from India?”) I answered in the affirmative, we did the quick “Where in India are you from?” exchange and she shared that she was from Delhi. She proceeds to tell me about how she’s looking for a place to stay, and goes, “So can I come stay with you?”
…… Mind you, I hadn’t known her all of two minutes. It’s not like I’m averse to helping people in need, or that I need to be well-acquainted with them or anything, but something didn’t feel right in my gut, so I was not about to share my personal details with her. So bs’d a bit, trying to brush her off, saying, “Uh.. I live with my parents, and our apartment is small”, etc. etc. because I didn’t have the balls to say “No, I’m sorry I’m not going to bring a stranger, an odd one, at that, to my home, whether they’re from BharatMa or not.” She continued to tell me her story, saying that her car’s parked at someone’s place but she has nowhere to stay, so can she please come stay with me, or if I have friends that she can stay with, or can help her find a place. So I suggest a couple of websites that would be of great help aka sulekha.com or craigslist, and she continued being wierd, trying to push staying with me. Well, the train rolled in, I breathed a small silent sigh of relief, and got up to board. I reminded her of the websites again, and wished her good luck. I knew that she had to take the same train, so I went in a different direction, specifically picking a seat that didn’t have much room for someone else, especially with me and my billions of bags. There were, literally, a number of available open rows, and she came and sat next to me. She kept trying to make conversation, and this point it’s very apparent that I don’t want to engage in conversation. The woman tells me that she studied computer science and has 8 years of experience, and that she’s on her way to the city to meet some lady about a job. Ok, this may be a bit silly, but how is a comp sci. person not going to know about craigslist or sulekha especially if they’re an f.o.b.? Realistically. Later on, she wanted to exchange numbers, and when I asked her about her area code, she mentioned that she lived in Boston before coming to New Jersey. Then, after I mentioned craigslist and them a few times she goes, “Yeah actually I’ve tried them but they didn’t work.” She keeps falling asleep, and then mentions “I haven’t slept in 2 days because I’m so pareshaan (worried) about my situation” because, apparently, she has nowhere to sleep. Jewel slept in her car – this chick has a car – worst come to worst she could’ve taken a nap in it… and how did she end up at the train station if her cars somewhere else? Did a friend in the area drop her? And if she has so many friends in the area she doesn’t have one friend with a couch? It, among other things, just didn’t add up. QUITE wierd. To seem more legit, as if she wasn’t trying to use me, she kept asking me to tell her about myself and my family. I just made some crap up – again, I didn’t feel right sharing personal details with her. She asked if we could exchange numbers, and gave me her cell phone # – I told her I didn’t have one. Then, again, she’s like “Yeah so if I could come stay with you that’d be greeaaat…” Bro, I just told you my situation. I told her it would be up to my parents, so she said, “So can you call your parents and ask them?”…. wtf.
“Sure, I’ll ask them when I get to school.” (I was on my into Newark because I’m taking summer classes- one of which I have in 40 min. ugh.) “Actually if you can call them now that’d be great.” “I don’t have a cell phone, remember?” (One of the few moments I was praying no one would call me.) But, note, she didn’t offer her cell so I could call them either… shady. Not that I planned on calling, but I’m just saying..
Also, I had noticed a few minutes after we had boarded the train that she hadn’t even asked my name – and as soon as the thought popped in my head, the woman said, “So, uh how do you pronounce your name? I mean, how do you spell it?” That’s a common networking trick. It’s what you ask someone if you can’t remember their name – but you ask one of those questions, not both – and especially not if you’re a fob – you would already know how to “pronounce” a Punjabi name if you’re from Delhi. Sorry for writing a novel, but this chick was so wierd. She also asked me if I’d like to be her friend. And asked me questions that had been asked and answered already… I couldn’t figure out if she was just kind of crazy, crazy due to sleep deprivation, or trying to scam me.
At one point, we clarified that she was going to New York Penn Station. I had to get off at Newark Penn, and when the stop was near, I got up, said good bye, told her I’d call her, and wished her good luck at that meeting about the job. She said bye.
I got out of the train, came downstairs, and out of the corner of my eye….. she was walking right behind me!! I just kept walking looking straight ahead. When I got to the corner near school, I looked behind me and she wasn’t there, so I have no idea where she went. It was truly an odd experience.
Her name was “Meenu”, by the way. So if you meet a girl named Meenu that looks like she’s going yachting and wants to sleep at your house, beware.
my theory is: bored, undereducated, smart person with an addiction to compulsive behaviors that he only now discovered. Plus, have you been to Richmond Hill? It’s not exactly the Upper East Side–I think a desire for the trappings of wealth might have something to do with it (look at what he did with the money).
FD, I’m officially freaked out by your story.
FD that was hysterical. I’m almost picturing your nice self entertaining her bullshit. I’d have made her day 🙂 Actually if I hadn’t known it personally I wouldn’t have believed it. A friend met a chick from Delhi on the subway some years ago. They started dating, he was really serious about her, trying to get her settled here while she essentially bilked him out of $9K. He somehow gets into her hotmail while trying to check his mail and finds out that she’s been trying to help her boyfriend in Delhi to get here with his funding. He dropped her. I still see her from time to time with a different guy each time. Wonder how much dough she’s made out of all the guys she’s fooled.
Fuerza Dulce, that is just way too creepy. You did a good thing by sharing it here.
I got scammed by one of my own people when I was an undergrad. I was walking up Madison Avenue and this not-at-all-scruffy young guy, early 20s at the most, maybe younger, comes up to me and says in a British (yeah right) accent that his wallet’s been stolen/lost and could I help him out with busfare?
Innocent little thing, I gave him a buck or two.
Month later, same area, same guy, same scam, talking to someone else. I walked up and called him on it while he was at the end of his spiel and the person listen was debating whether or not to give him something.
Give me the woman at Grand Central by the 7 line who keeps saying over and over in a high-pitched voice “CanIveadollar? CanIveadollar?” At least she gets straight to the point, honestly.
I was freaked out myself. I lived in Newark (Nork, or Newrk – not New Ark, like you Delaware wierdos) for about a year, and became decent at picking out the crazies from the people who really could use some help. This experience was truly odd, and taught me that Desis really are like everyone else – there are a few crazies in every batch, innit. If you’ve got some time, I’ve got some stories from my time in Brick City. 🙂
Here’s one:
Some dude was standing outside my apartment building, and approached me as I was exiting the building. His basic story was as follows:
-He’d just gotten out of the hospital -He had a baby at home a few towns away that was with a sitter – he really really needed to get back to this baby -He needed some money (gasp) -Prior to the hospital, he’d been out of jail a day and then got into a car accident, which was why he was in the hospital. -He had a friend who lived in the building in some random apartment #, but, as luck would have it, his friend wasn’t home
When I told him I didn’t have money on me (which was true – most broke grad students don’t), he generously offered to accompany me to an ATM, or wait while I went to an ATM and came back with money for him. …. riiiight.
But hey, I’m not trying to say you shouldn’t help those who need it. Vandkey chakna, as some would say. Help as many people as you can, how you can.
You just have to be a bit smarter, that’s all.
JOAT, similar story, except the guy I know actually got married to a girl from India. She joined him in the States 6 months after the wedding, wouldn’t consummate the marriage because she was “scarred”. My friend was trying to be understanding, but as time went on, he got suspicious about her motives. He also was able to check her email (because he came home early one day to surprise her and she had left it open), and found that she had a guy back home. When he confronted her, she had the audacity to ask him, “well know that you know, can I just stay with you till I get my greencard?”
He had her deported asap.
“But seeing brown folks, as it were, committing and getting punished for petty crimes, actually humanizes us in a way. It takes us out of these far extreme categories like, “super smart at spelling and math, sit down and take orders from bill gates” type and the “turban wearing, beard having, allah akbar terrorist” type.”
But this guy was VALEDICTORIAN at Rikers! He must have been “super smart at spelling and math”…
(see bottom of first page, right before the author calls him “Hollywood handsome” – geez. At least it wasn’t “exotic”.)
Really, I’m sure that being Valedictorian here may not be comparable with the same demographic of a school “on the outside.” Unless you can be super smart at shiv making and soap dropping?
Funny story FD
I had the same experience while taking the train from JSQ to NYc (path), this guy’s name was Sunil. He also said he is from delhi and yadi yada yada, he wanted some money. Being from Jersey City, I knew these types and just kept nodding to everything he had to say.
Another time, this girl Sonia was trying to make me come to those “amway” presentations in woodbridge telling me how much extra money she has made and whatnot.
chipku log !
What should be a crime, if not an affront to all those little desi kids winning Spelling Bee contests, is the horrendous grammar and spelling displayed by some of the writers in this thread. Are we already so mainstreamed?
LoLZ TeACHer!!! DAT DefINaTely iz fuNnY!!!
Pray tell us how does the bad grammar on this thread take away from Binny or Bittu winning the Spelling Bee? You were just looking for something to whine about weren’t you? Admit it.
Only if you believe in collective guilt.
I think the amway(and similar) crap should be considered on par with any scam mentioned here. Evil manipulative schmucks… I got suckered into attending a ‘conference’ (Seeing as the guy who was taking me was talking about some cool science-y stuff at the time, I assumed the conference was related… yeah, I know, I was gullible). Anyway, long story short… I was driven there… couldn’t leave… witnessed what can only be described as the indoctrination of a number of people into the cult of money, complete with shouts of (I kid you not) hallelujah! and Amen brother! I decided to play things out a little longer to just mess with the guy after I witnessed the second half of the seminar (which was apparently only geared towards people already part of the cult). I actually invited him over to my place and cooked some paranthas for him. He was really upset about coming over to my place since it wasn’t a ‘neutral’ location (his/the cult’s word choice there… he actually said, ‘could we meet at a more neutral location like a coffee shop?’… exactly like I heard the local cult leader tell the drones to do at the second half of the seminar). so yeah… once at my place, he tried every line that the leaders had suggested… when all of these failed, he just became rude…meh. Anyway, it turns out he’s approached just about every desi he’s seen at the UofAz. Not sure about how sucessful he’s been… but he’s certainly got an incredible number of people avoiding him like the plague.
i didn’t follow the “undereducated” motif guiding part of this discussion…
that’s up there with Stuy and Bronx Science…
for dasichist:
shitty SAT scores
(but seriously — i probably over extended myself in my last comment. i might blog about it some day, but for now, have no intention of discussing it. sorry!)
“Anyway, it turns out he’s approached just about every desi he’s seen at the UofAz”
I turned the table on one of these guys, He approached me in the supermarket once, pretended to look at the shrimp ramen. I started asking him if he likes shrimp or chicken better. He says he was buying it for his friend, so I return with “wow you’re a really great friend to pick up shrimp ramen” basically every lie he told I pushed it even further. As he was leaving I think we were talking about whether shrimp of the california or baltimore coast was better and its future for the ramen industry overall.
At least some of the guy’s motivations make sense to me. When I was in high school, it was cool to hack (Oh yeah! Cool among the nerd crowd, I meant). It was cool to break into password-protected sites, to see how far you can get, and to see if you could cover your tracks at all. Call it a stage of rebellion or a way of showing some corporate techie that you’re smarter than he is.
That’s still a stretch from stealing money or replacing someone’s photo with your own on their id, but I can identify with part of what Shiv Sharma was doing. The fact is that when you’re in high school, you usually have no concept that your actions have repercussions. I’m not excusing him, just saying that my friends and I back in high school can understand the motivation however misguided it may have been.
Janeofalltrades “Pray tell us how does the bad grammar on this thread take away from Binny or Bittu winning the Spelling Bee? You were just looking for something to whine about weren’t you? Admit it.”
Hey Janeofalltrades, since the English teacher’s reprimand, the grammar did get better in this thread. Also, from my simple-minded phys ed teacher’s perspective, flaunting something offensive does not have to detract from anybody in order to remain what it is – offensive. Let’s say you decided to venture out in the real world without the daily help of a shower and deodorant. And you stank – just hypothetically, of course. But all your friends smelled pretty nice. Your BO will not be taking anything away from your friends’ perfumed efforts, but your BO would still be reprehensible, right?
I am sympathetic when the poor and downtrodden of this country use bad grammar. But a bunch of desis? C’mon, your first-generation, education-centric parents probably paid your way through college in entirety without your ever having to flip a single burger. So what’s the bravado in playing “ghetto” with the language?
BrooklynBrown –
we used to horse around with that stuff too, although it was before your time, or before consumer internet. our shit was so old school you can find scribblings of the schematics on the back of the Constitution. “Phreaking” (and i’m NOT talking about the dance floor), acoustic couplers, 300 baud modems, tape recorders (to literally RECORD code), etc. i got licked once pretty bad for it in 8th grade when a “Miscellaneous Investigations” department from Company XXX called up my folks to ask how a few thousand dollars of phone calls were originating from our home phone using a calling card i grabbed off a well known BBS i was part of. THE GIRLS LOVED IT.
I was actually a friend of his in high school. He actually sold me and my friends stuff he bought from the cards he scammed. He really just did it to have money and it was easy. There’s no real in-depth reason to it.
this man is my idol. I am doing the same shit as him to get my money up. i wouldn’t mind making millions of dollars each year just by using a computer.