Police say that 25 yr old Michael Bemben faces 32 Criminal charges after a Police investigation.
Niagara Regional Police #2 Street Crime Detectives were alerted to Bemben, a Niagara Falls resident, due to the large amount of jewelry that he was selling to local Pawn Shops and detectives commenced an investigation in mid-November of 2014.
Through the investigation, detectives learned that Bemben was employed as a Duct Work Cleaner and that he had been reported to Police as a suspect of jewelry theft after he finished cleaning duct work by some customers.
Police then obtained a Production Order and served it upon his employer to obtain a Customer List of the residences that Bemben had attended to do duct cleaning. They also attended all the Pawn Shops in the Niagara Region and were able to recover some of the property that was stolen and sold by Bemben.
Bemben is accused of stealing from 26 customers between August 12th and October 28th of 2014 including over $38,000 of jewelry. Police were able to recover some of the jewelry that he had sold to 8 different Pawn Shops in the Niagara Region where he received just over $1000.
Only 6 people were able to identify jewelry that the Police recovered which was returned to the victims. Numerous pieces of jewelry that was recovered were not identified by the customers.
Twenty five year old Michael Bemben is charged with 23 counts of Theft Under $5000, 3 counts of Theft Over $5000 and 6 counts of Possession of Stolen Property Under $5000. He was arrested on January 19th, 2015 and held in custody pending a Bail Hearing.
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