US Secret Service teams with Baton Rouge law enforcement to arrest identity thief
Thursday, November 20th, 2008Could it happen that after committing so much identity theft and deception, the perpetrator completely loses track of who he is?
Rodney Roussell was arrested this week in Baton Rouge, LA after the US Secret Service and the East Baton Rouge Parish sheriff’s deputies spent months tracking him down.
When Rousell was arrested, investigators say they found an ID bearing his picture and someone else’s name; the same name was also found on six different credit cards.
Rousell’s cell phone was in one name; his apartment was in another. He uses yet another name as an entertainer, and his car was purchased using the Social Security number of an elderly woman from Texas. Besides all that, Rousell is a cross dresser, but was dressed as a man when he was arrested at a nightclub.
Some of Rousell’s stolen identities help him receive bank loans, and others were used to rack up roughly $90,000 in counterfeit check charges.
Rousell is also wanted on fraud and identity theft charges in Texas.
Identity thieves seldom limit themselves to just one victim, or even a single type of criminal behavior. Likewise, consumers need more than one plan of defense to protect themselves from identity theft.