Alleged leader of $4.4M jewelry theft ring arrested in Colombia
Jaime Torres Castiblanco, 51, appeared Friday at U.S. District Court in Hartford where he pleaded not guilty to conspiracy and interstate transportation of stolen property charges, according to federal prosecutors.
Also arrested was co-conspirator Elvis Guevara Quintero, 51. He also pleaded not guilty to the same charges.
Sentencing documents for another co-conspirator, Harold Ramirez Cagua, detailed the theft ring, which one prosecutor described as “echoing aspects of a Hollywood heist movie.”
“This was a sophisticated, disciplined, and cruelly successful enterprise,” Assistant U.S. Attorney David Huang wrote in a sentencing memorandum. He said the co-defendants “used burner phones to conceal their identities and movements, signal jammers to defeat security systems, and carefully coordinated their exits and entries to pull off their crimes.”
The crew operated from May 2023 to April 2024, hitting multiple jewelry stores and kiosks in Connecticut, New Jersey, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and Virginia, and allegedly stole more than $4.4 million in jewelry, according to court documents.
On Oct. 5, 2023 at the Connecticut Post Mall, Torres Castiblanco and five other members of the crew, including Torres Castiblanco and Guevara Quintero, allegedly entered the mall at different times and different entrances.
Surveillance footage showed Torres Castiblanco and others approaching the closed kiosk carrying bags before disappearing from view near the counter, according to the sentencing memorandum.
About 10 minutes later, three of the men walked quickly from the kiosk, with one man carrying what appeared to be a heavy bag, the memorandum stated.
The day after the robbery, cellphone data from one of the men was traced to Queens, where much of the stolen jewelry was sold to the owner of a jewelry store, who then sold it to others, including those he knew would melt down the gold. The Connecticut Post Mall burglary netted about $273.149, according to court records.
The crew is accused of casing stores beforehand, spending days in one location before committing the offense. Sometimes crew members pose as legitimate customers to inspect the merchandise and security system, according to the memorandum.
When it came to committing an alleged burglary, the crew is accused of smashing display cases, forcing their way into closed businesses and in one case, cutting through walls to get inside, according to court records.
Torres Castiblanco is described in the sentencing memorandum as the leader of the organization, who identified potential jobs and assembled teams for each burglary, the records stated.