SPRINGFIELD, MA (WGGB/WSHM) — Our newsroom has received many calls and emails from electronic benefits transfer, or EBT, recipients over the last couple of weeks who said their food assistance benefits for the month of February were stolen.
“We’re the most vulnerable of the community, but we’re still part of the community and we deserve answers, we deserve a timeline…We deserve some kind of answers…and it just doesn’t seem to be coming,” said Gary Rosemond of Springfield.
On February 3, Rosemond went to the grocery store with his EBT allowance in-hand, but he was turned away after swiping his card at the register.
“I had to do it again because I got angry. I was like ‘Why’re you trying to embarrass me?’ and then when I said ‘Wait a minute, let me call my card’ and it was like I had $2 left on there,” Rosemond added.
Rosemond told Western Mass News that his EBT allotment of $230 for food assistance for the month was gone, just one day after he received them. He’s one of many across western Massachusetts.
“We’ve dozens of reports or so of individuals in our station of individuals having money taken out of their DTA account,” said Springfield Police spokesperson Ryan Walsh.
Walsh told Western Mass News that his department is working alongside the Massachusetts Department of Transitional Assistance (DTA) and other agencies to put a stop to EBT credit card skimming.
“On February 2, on the Friday, on a grocery store on Belmont Ave., our officers arrested an individual who was retrieving two credit card terminal covers,” Walsh added.
Ion Stoica was charged by Springfield Police on February 2 with two counts of identity fraud and one count of destruction of property. The police report from Stoica’s arrest read, in part: “Ion pulled a credit card skimming device off of terminal one and began walking towards the exit.”
The owner of the store expressed customers had shared with him that funds had disappeared from their accounts after shopping at his store. Officers believe that Stoica’s machines are consistent with the missing funds.
“That person was retrieving these types of skimming devices, it’s not connected yet to these EBT thefts, but it’s more likely than not that this was tied in somehow,” Walsh explained.
Stoica was arraigned on February 3 and posted his $2,000 bail, but that hasn’t been the only case.
“When we came across one, we went ahead and alerted officials and looked at all of our locations, at all of our devices,” said Big Y spokesperson Jade Rivera-McFarlin.
On Friday, Big Y released a statement that said that, across 10 Massachusetts stores, they discovered each had one skimming device installed from December 19 through December 21. Additionally, they said a device was installed in their Westfield location from December 19 through January 12. The Springfield-based grocer said they are investigating the circumstances and are continuously inspecting all of their terminals and working with law enforcement.
“We’re checking, so when something like this happens, we immediately want to jump on that and let people know that if we should find that somebody’s information was compromised, we are obviously going to work with them to make sure they can protect themselves,” Rivera-McFarlin
Rosemond told Western Mass News that he shopped at the Big Y on St James Avenue in Springfield before his benefits were stolen. That is one of the stores on the grocery chain’s list of impacted stores. Now, he’s still waiting to be reimbursed by the DTA.
“I don’t know if they’re even going to replace the benefits that were stolen. That’s how in the dark everyone is…We don’t know if or when anything is going to result from this,” Rosemond explained.
In a statement to Western Mass News, the DTA said they are “…committed to protecting our clients against fraudulent activities and ensuring they have access to the benefits they’ve been issued.”
When Rosemond paid the Springfield DTA office a visit, he said he was told he would eventually be reimbursed. Whether that will happen next month or not is still to be determined.
“I’m optimistic…Confident no, optimistic yes,” Rosemond said.
For the time being, Rosemond is taking things one meal at a time and getting help from friends.
[Reporter: What did you have for breakfast today?]
“Uhh, I just, two muffins and some orange juice and that’s ‘cuz I had the muffins left from a couple days ago,” Rosemond noted.
[Reporter: What are you going to eat for lunch?]
“To be determined…” Rosemond added.
[Reporter: “…And dinner?”]
“To be determined…but…I’m gonna eat something. I mean, I got a friend that comes by. His wife cooks, he’ll bring me a plate, stuff like that so…it’s not embarrassing, but it’s really humbling…you know…it’s…I don’t know…but it is embarrassing at the same time,” Rosemond noted.
Like so many others, Rosemond will hold his breathe until March 2.
“The computer says I will be getting something on March 2. How I make it from now until March 2 is by going into debt to eat,” Rosemond said.
The DTA and Springfield Police Department recommend that all shoppers, not just EBT recipients, to examine machines before using them. If they were tampered with, the machine will not be stable at the register. As another layer off security, they said run cards as credit, not debit, as much as possible.
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