Miami restaurant employee banked over $30,000 by voiding transactions, cops say
Over an 18-month period, an employee of El Carajo in Miami banked over $30,000 by voiding transactions and pocketing the money, police say.
On Thursday Oscar Orta, 30, was arrested and charged with grand theft and organized fraud. He was being held Friday in Miami-Dade’s Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center on a $15,000 bond, records show.
Orta was hired in 2016 as a cashier for the restaurant, gas station and bakery at 2465 SW 17th Ave. Beginning in April of 2017, he voided several transactions a day, police said. The behavior continued through November 2018 when management noticed an “inordinate amount of voided transactions,” according to an arrest report.
Through an audit and review of surveillance video, investigators found a total of 742 canceled transactions. They said Orta walked away with more than $33,000.
Orta, who primarily rang up purchases from the gas station and convenience store, was seen on surveillance video voiding transactions long after the customer was gone, police said in the report.
At the end of his shift, he would place the extra money in his drawer in a paper towel and take it, police said.
Police say he later told officers he took the money and offered to pay it back, according to the report.
In 2016, Orta was charged with grand theft involving an automobile, but the case was later closed with no action, court records show.
A woman who answered El Carajo’s phone would not answer a reporter’s questions Friday.
This story was originally published November 1, 2019 at 7:39 PM.
