A 69-year-old Providence man is headed to federal prison after admitting he helped drain thousands of gift cards that charities, churches, and schools had bought in bulk to help struggling families across Rhode Island and Massachusetts. Esteban “Steven” Antonio Perez was sentenced to 36 months of incarceration followed by three years of supervised release for his role in the scheme.
Perez previously pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit access device fraud and access device fraud, according to fallriverreporter.com. Prosecutors say that between October 2024 and October 2025, Perez and his co-conspirators compromised at least 2,591 gift cards, causing more than $230,000 in losses, though WJAR reported the figure as around 2,500 cards compromised by Perez and another person.
Cards Meant for Families in Need
The gift cards at the center of the case were not random consumer purchases. They had been bought in bulk by more than 80 organizations, including charities, churches, and schools, and were meant to support individuals and families in need, per the same account of the Department of Justice’s description. Instead, members of the conspiracy used the stolen card numbers to purchase baby formula, household goods, coffee, energy drinks, food, and other items from a major grocery store chain operating in Rhode Island and Massachusetts.
Perez’s specific role, according to the report, was acting as the operation’s primary fence. He allegedly bought the stolen goods from co-conspirators at discounted rates and then resold them to local grocery stores and bodegas. When investigators moved in, they reportedly found his vehicle and storage unit filled with food products stored in unsanitary conditions.
Retailer Forced to Investigate and Reimburse
The scale of the fraud was enough to force the victim grocery chain to devote extensive investigative resources to tracking it down. The company ultimately reimbursed affected customers, many of them nonprofits serving people in need. The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Taylor Dean and investigated by Homeland Security Investigations, the outlet noted.
A Growing Pattern Across New England
Perez’s sentencing lands amid a string of gift-card fraud cases that have surfaced around the region in recent years. In South Kingstown, police arrested two New York men accused of stealing and tampering with thousands of gift cards across Rhode Island, according to WPRI. Officers in that case found three boxes containing 1,848 altered gift cards, plus another 935 cards at a pharmacy that appeared to have been tampered with.
WPRI’s reporting also laid out how these scams typically work: either a fraudulent barcode is attached to an unsold gift card, or the information from a legitimate card is stolen and placed back on a store rack, waiting for an unsuspecting shopper to activate it. Rhode Island lawmakers have tried to get ahead of the problem. Public Laws 2023, Chapters 167 and 168, effective June 20, 2023, require retailers in the state that display gift cards for sale to post a notice warning customers of gift-card fraud and offering instructions on how to protect themselves, according to the Rhode Island Department of Business Regulation.
The Perez case is also part of a broader national trend federal investigators have flagged in recent months. In South Florida, a Chinese national pleaded guilty in federal court for his role in a gift-card fraud scheme targeting grocery stores across several counties, per the U.S. Department of Justice. And a federal grand jury in New Hampshire indicted a Chinese national who is also a Lynnfield, Massachusetts resident on conspiracy charges tied to an international gift-card fraud operation, the agency separately announced in a release posted by the Department of Justice’s Office of Public Affairs.
