Internet Fraud Casebook

Chapter 12. The eBay-Fraud Brothers

GERARD (JERRY) BUCHLEITNER

Adam and Jeffrey Yazco were brothers. They were less than two years apart in age and were the only children in a middle-class family in a suburb of Columbia, South Carolina. Adam was a senior in high school and had a very outgoing personality. Jeffrey was right behind Adam — a high-school junior. While Adam spent most of his time in school socializing and making new friends, Jeffrey was considered a loner. One thing students at school relied on Jeffrey for was troubleshooting their computer problems. But he had few social skills and, as a result, no real friends. Neither of the Yazco brothers, though, was by any means popular with the school administration. Both had truancy records and had been in trouble with the law. Vandalism and destruction of property in their neighborhood had their parents, both of whom had jobs, scrambling to keep their sons out of the local juvenile correctional facility. Mr. and Mrs. Yazco were instrumental in enabling — through the liberal application of attorneys' fees — Adam and Jeffrey to each receive one year of unsupervised probation for their crimes. The juvenile judge informed the brothers that, should any additional trouble follow them during their year on probation, they would both be spending time behind bars.

The neighborhood in which the Yazco brothers' vandalism occurred was used to these types of juvenile crimes. Many of the homes were abandoned in the 1990s and their upkeep was ...