Woman Charged In $258K Lowe's Fraud Scheme No Hacker, Her Attorney Says

BRICK, NJ — The attorney for a Brick Township woman who is charged with exploiting a weakness in the Lowe's website to steal nearly $13,000 worth of goods is a young, stay-at-home immigrant mother who lacks the computer sophistication needed to hack a major retailer's website.

"It just doesn't make any sense whatsoever," said Jef Henninger, attorney for Romela Velazquez, who is charged with second-degree computer criminal activity for accessing a computer system with the purpose to defraud and two charges of theft by deception in the wake of her Aug. 3 arrest. "A young mother with no prior criminal history (has) become a criminal mastermind charged with hacking the website of one of the largest retailers in the world. Really?"

The Ocean County prosecutor's office alleges Romela Velazquez, 24, exploited weaknesses in the Lowe's website to have items shipped to her home without paying for them, said Al Della Fave, spokesman for the prosecutor's office. After receiving the items at home, she then posted several of the stolen items to a local Facebook group "Buy and Sell" page, often listing the items as "new in box" and selling them for less than half their original price, he said. Her husband, Kimy Velazquez, 40, also was charged in the scheme, with third-degree receipt of stolen property and third-degree fencing, Della Fave said.

Authorities allege Romela Velazquez attempted to take more than $258,000 worth of merchandise but ended up getting $12,971.23 worth of items, including an aluminum gazebo, a stainless steel Weber grill and other items, Della Fave said. The investigation into whether other retailers were affected was continuing, he said; authorities also confiscated $2,500 worth of Victoria's Secret panties and a Nikon D5000 camera, he said.

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Henninger, however, insists Romela Velazquez paid for items and has receipts to prove it, and called what she did a form of extreme couponing.

"My client finds deals online. Sometimes those deals might be mistakes; sometimes they are slash deals," he said, where a company has drastically cut the price of an item to sell a few remaining pieces of inventory to clear out for something new.

"The average person might not pay attention to them, but there are some Facebook groups that do and send out alerts" when deals come up, Henninger said. "Imagine Black Friday all year-round — it's sporadic and infrequent, but they occur."

"It's not illegal to buy things at a big discount and sell them," he said. "Like many young mothers, she needs to stretch every dollar that she can. These are the same deals that any of us can take advantage of; but most of us are too busy to learn how to spot them."

Della Fave said the prosecutor's office would not comment on Henninger's claims.

"We're not going to try the case in the press," he said. "The case will move forward to the courts and will be heard in the courts."

Henninger said Romela Velazquez came to the United States from the Philippines "a couple of years ago," and she and her husband have a 2-year-old child.

"She's from a third-world country with no computer background," he said. "English is her second language. She's a young mother. The idea that she's going to come up with some hacking scheme is ridiculous."

Henninger, who has several offices around New Jersey and covers a number of issues including immigration law, said he is representing only Romela. Though she is an immigrant, there are no immigration issues right now. He did not know who is representing Kimy Velazquez but said he believed Velazquez would be seeking a public defender.

He declined to say who was paying him to represent Romela Velazquez: "Some people have access to resources," he said.

"We don't understand the allegations of exploiting a loophole," Henninger said. "If the website has something wrong with it and she's smart enough to find something wrong at such as a really low price, how is that exploiting it?"

"I'll be very interested to see the discovery," he said. "She maintains her innocence and looks forward to her day in court."

Romela Velazquez photo via Division of Motor Vehicles, provided by Ocean County Prosecutor's Office