Man Gets Prison Time For ATM Scheme Involving Fairfield Bank

FAIRFIELD, CT — A man was sentenced Tuesday in Hartford to 33 months behind bars for his role in an ATM skimming scheme that defrauded banks across Connecticut and the country, including in Fairfield, authorities said.

George Dragusin, a 65-year-old citizen of Romania who also goes by “Georgio Anderini” and “Einstein,” installed and removed ATM skimming equipment at several banks in Connecticut and used re-encoded cards and personal identification numbers to get money from multiple banks, according to a news release from the U.S. Attorney of the District of Connecticut.

The scheme involved using skimming devices to capture account and PIN numbers from bank customers, and then making substitute cards, which were used to obtain money and buy things, the news release said. One Connecticut bank suffered about $286,000 in losses after about 35 skimming incidents between February and June of 2017 at branches in Fairfield, Greenwich, Monroe, Stratford and Trumbull, according to the news release.

Dragusin was arrested in 2018 in Hayward, California, and has been detained ever since, the news release said. He pleaded guilty in 2019 to conspiracy to commit bank fraud and aggravated identity theft, according to the news release. In addition to his participation in the Connecticut incidents, he was also involved in skimming operations in California, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio and Nevada, the news release said. Those operations caused multiple banks to lose over $645,000, according to the news release.