Group bribed Target workers to cut prices on items in $177,000 scheme, Florida cops say

A group bribed Target workers in Florida to drastically mark down items, then they would return counterfeit products in a $177,000 scheme, authorities said.

As the result of an investigation that lasted nearly a year, six people were charged.

McClatchy News reached out to all six parties’ attorneys for comment Jan. 16. One attorney declined to comment and the others did not immediately respond.

Target loss prevention became suspicious in February when it noticed that one employee had given nearly $27,000 in discounts to the same two people, 36-year-old Lin Chen and 33-year-old Yun Zheng, according to an affidavit filed Jan. 12 in Polk County.

The employee admitted he received an Apple watch, cash, two gift cards and Starbucks drinks in exchange for helping the accused scammers, according to the Polk County Sheriff’s Office.

The worker would tell Zheng his schedule so they could receive his employee markdowns, often in the form of unauthorized price matches, until he was arrested in February, deputies said.

But even after that employee’s arrest, the accused scammers worked with another Target employee to receive steep discounts on Apple iPads, according to deputies. That worker was arrested in September.

As part of the scheme, Zheng, Chen and two more people, later identified as 32-year-old Hang Yang and 33-year-old Haoyi Ren, would purchase items such as expensive Apple, Sony and Bose electronics, then return counterfeit products totaling over $60,000, deputies said.

They were all captured on camera, sometimes with each other, carrying out the scheme, according to deputies.

Investigators began monitoring them and said that in one day, Yang visited five different Targets in the Tampa Bay area and bought iPads, then tried to return merchandise unsuccessfully.

Deputies said they returned counterfeit items to Target stores in at least six Florida counties, mostly in the Tampa Bay area.

They would also use gift card credits from returning counterfeit items to buy more items, but in another layer of the scheme, they also used gift cards from 58 people who had been scammed, causing those people to lose over $27,000, deputies said.

“They apparently are sending this back to China, and they have a contact in China that is sending them knockoff stuff,” Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd told WTVT. “So, then they take the knockoff stuff, they put it back in the package and rip Target off again when they return it.”

The four accused scammers were charged with racketeering and conspiracy to commit racketeering, while the two employees in Lakeland were charged with obtaining property by fraud and first-degree petit theft, according to Polk County records.

Jail records show Chen, Zheng and Ren were all arrested Dec. 26, but Yang wasn’t arrested until Jan. 13.

Judd told WTVT this scheme is probably even bigger than it appears.

“We believe that there is an organized system even behind them,” he said.