By: Joshua Ceballos/News Director
A man accused of tricking students into buying fake subscriptions for comic books has been arrested by the FIU Police Department.
Travaris Robinson, a 24 year old man from Hollywood, FL, was taken into police custody on Friday, Nov. 2, for trespassing in the Graham Center parking lot, according to a police report provided by FIUPD.
After being apprehended for trespassing, police realized that Robinson matched the description of a reported individual who had been promising students comic book subscriptions at a later date, in return for money up front.
None of these students ever received the subscriptions they were promised.
Robinson has been pulling this scam since January 2018, and according to the report, he’s stolen about $688 under the false pretense that he was raising money for a hospital or for a scholarship fund.
Police had recently received a lot more reports of the comic book crime after FIUPD put out a timely warning email on Thursday, Nov. 1, which alerted the University about this scam, as well as a shell game spree going on on MMC, said FIUPD Chief Alexander Casas.
The email was sent out after FIUPD received a few reports of the shell game, and an anonymous tip about the comics.
Casas said that a student anonymously reported that they were approached by someone with a handwritten list of comic books, who asked if they would like to buy them. The individual did not have the comic books on hand, but promised to deliver the comics at a later time after receiving payment, saying that they were selling them as part of a scholarship.
“The student was smart enough to know that this didn’t make sense, refused, and then reported it via the silent reporting system,” Casas said.
After the timely warning email, Casas said that FIUPD received several more reports with descriptions of the perpetrator of the comic scam, which helped them in the arrest of Robinson the following day.
Robinson was charged with one count of “organized scheme to defraud” and one count of “grand theft in the 3rd degree” for his comic book scam.
The other scam that’s been reported on campus, the shell game, is something Casas calls a “game of confidence.”
The shell game is when an individual hides a peanut or some object under a shell and shuffles it along with two other shells, and asks a participant to guess which shell has the peanut.
The trick with these games, said Casas, is inspiring confidence in the victim by allowing them to win the first few games and then convincing them to up the stakes by betting large sums of money, ultimately rigging the game and cheating the victim out of money.
“You can see how a young student who is on financial aid and struggling would be desperate for some easy money and could be vulnerable to this type of scam,” said Casas.
Casas said that there have been two reported incidences of this scam on campus, each one with very similar descriptions of the perpetrator and the circumstances, and so this justified the Police Department putting out a timely warning via email.
This case, as of press time, is currently under investigation.
These types of cases don’t usually get reported, said Casas, because students can get embarrassed about losing their money, and don’t tell the police. The more these things get reported, said Casas, the easier time that other victims will have to come forward and catch the perpetrators.
“We are informing the portion of the public that may have been victimized and may not have reported it, and making those that otherwise wouldn’t have heard it aware of what’s going on,” said Casas.
Casas said that students can anonymously report crimes by going to police.fiu.edu and clicking on the red tab. This method however, should not be done in every case.
“If you’re witnessing an ongoing crime or an emergency, however, call 305-348-5911 for emergencies or 305-348-2626.
Featured image from Unsplash