MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, Fla. — Jail records show a Cuban national living near Cutler Bay is facing four felony charges and an immigration hold after sheriff’s deputies say he used trickery to scam a woman out of $1,000 in a “spoof call” scheme.
Investigators with the Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office said Leandro Sanchez Leyva pretended to be a representative of Atlanta-based Delta Community Credit Union, spoofing a real phone number for the financial institution, and using “deceptive tactics to psychologically manipulate and persuade the victim into believing her USAA Bank account had sustained a series of fraudulent transactions and that a full-scale account takeover was occurring.”
An MDSO report states that Sanchez, 33, “utilized fear and urgency” in order to get the woman to send him $1,000 via Zelle, claiming that the digital payment service was “a way to curtail and prevent fraud.”
Deputies said that bank records later showed that he withdrew the funds from his Wells Fargo account.
According to the report, the woman later told detectives she felt “deceived” by the “sophisticated” impersonation. Detectives said they showed her a photo of Sanchez and she told them she had no idea who he was.
The report doesn’t state how he’s alleged to have gotten her information prior to calling her. It also doesn’t state whether she lived in South Florida or elsewhere.
Deputies took Sanchez into custody on Thursday at his apartment in the 10400 block of Old Cutler Road, just outside of the Cutler Bay town limits.
According to the report, he “confessed and admitted to knowingly receiving the fraudulent deposits from the victim” and admitted visiting two ATMs to withdraw the ill-gotten funds from his bank account on separate days.
Deputies took Sanchez into custody on charges of organized scheme to defraud, grand theft, fraudulent use of personal identification information and communications fraud.
He was being held in the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center as of Friday morning. Online county corrections department records indicate that he posted a $10,000 bond, though it’s unclear whether the listed immigration hold might keep him in TGK for an extended period.
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