BALTIMORE, MD—A Baltimore County man has pleaded guilty to stealing over $1.5 million from victims across the U.S. in a bank fraud scheme, according to the announcement of the guilty plea this week by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Maryland.

Theodore Sapperstein, 66, of Pikesville, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit bank fraud. He is facing a maximum of 30 years in federal prison for the charges.

The guilty plea states that Sapperstein and his co-conspirators, who were not named in the court documents, unlawfully debited money from the bank accounts of victims across the U.S. without their authorization. The unauthorized debits were made by creating shell companies and falsely claiming that the debits were authorized for services provided by those shell companies.

The debits were made against the bank accounts of multiple victims, which resulted in returned transactions and high return rates, which could raise the attention of banks.

To cover up the tracks, Sapperstein and his co-conspirators made “micro debit” transactions to lower the return rates to levels that would reduce the risk of bank scrutiny and possible termination of banking services. The micro debits were made against other bank accounts that Sapperstein and his co-conspirators controlled and/or funded.

Sentencing is scheduled for August 15, 2024.

This article was written with the assistance of AI and reviewed by a human editor.

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