The Most Talked About South Florida News In 2008
Dec 30, 2008 7:24 am US/Eastern
Sweetwater Police Arrest Fugitive Travel Agent
Cops Say Cash Deals Were Too Good To Be True
Customers Paid For Tickets They Didn't Get
SWEETWATER (CBS4) ―
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Ruth Morales
Miami Dade Corrections/CBS
Sweetwater Police have arrested a travel agent who allegedly stole thousands of dollars from customers who thought they were buying plane tickets to go to Nicaragua but ended up empty handed once they got to the airport.
Monday night police arrested Ruth Morales after she fled her own travel agency.
In her apartment near Flagler Street in West Miami-Dade, Claudia Tellez's bags were all packed, stacked on the living room floor, wrapped in security plastic and ready for international travel. But Tellez isn't going anywhere.
Sweetwater police say she was among many victims of a holiday travel scam that saw customers pay cash for plane tickets that didn't exist.
As of Monday, more than a half dozen victims had reported buying plane tickets for Nicaragua at the Nicaraguita Travel Agency, only to discover - at the airport - that the tickets had never been purchased by the agent who took their money.
Nicaraguita's owner, Morales, 49, was nowhere to be found. Her agency on West Flagler Street is closed. Inside, office equipment and computers are gone. Police evidence tape seals the front door.
"My father in Nicaragua, he is so sick," customer Tellez told
CBS4 reporter Gary Nelson. "I haven't seen him in years. He's been crying, everybody has been crying, because we had plans."
"I paid cash for three tickets," she said. "$1,296."
Cops say it was a deal too good to be true.
"This woman preyed on poor people," Sweetwater police chief Roberto Fulgeira said. "They saved their money all year - bought gifts for family - to travel to Nicaragua, but when they got to the airport there was no ticket under their name, because this person had never purchased the tickets for them."
Investigators say they expect to hear from more victims as they arrive for flights to Managua, a destination Morales specialized in.
"The place was jammin'," Fulgeira said of the travel agency. "There were a lot of people there buying tickets because she was giving the cash discount."
Fulgeira said Morales ran the agency for several years without incident, but for reasons not yet clear "just went crazy" during the holidays. The first victims began to appear at the Taca Airlines counter on Saturday.
Police say the airline had no knowledge of the scam until passengers began arriving to travel on tickets that never existed.
"They have no money now to go see their families, they have no way of getting there, and this woman is nowhere to be found," Fulgeira said.
Victim Tellez is among the fortunate ones. She was able to borrow the money to buy replacement plane tickets - for about three times the amount she paid the alleged scammer.
Her husband, Eduardo, choked back tears as he spoke of family he hasn't seen in years and a reunion that will now be cut short by nearly a week.
"How can there be a person like this," he asked. "How can someone do such a terrible thing to people on the holidays?"
Sweetwater police had asked other law enforcement agencies to be on the lookout for the fugitive travel agent, wanted for multiple counts of grand theft. The Department of Immigration & Customs Enforcement had also been put on alert, to guard against the possibility that Morales would attempt to flee the country to her native Nicaragua.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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