Man who stole $800,000 from elderly person in Miami area pleads guilty to fraud
Michel Duarte Suarez, 50, ended up stealing more than $800,000 from the person's account and laundered the money with the help of associates in the Miami area, according to his plea agreement filed on Wednesday in Miami federal court.
Suarez pleaded guilty to conspiring to commit bank and mail fraud, along with aggravated identity theft. He faces several years in prison, including mandatory-minimum punishment of two years for the ID theft conviction, at his sentencing hearing in September before U.S. District Judge Kathleen Williams.
Suarez was indicted in 2023 but was living in Panama City, Panama, at the time. In early 2025, he was arrested in Panama and brought to South Florida to face the charges.
According to a factual statement filed with his plea agreement, here's how Suarez carried out the scam during an FBI-led undercover operation:
More than 80 fraudulent checks
In March 2022, Suarez told a confidential informant that he had access to the bank account of an elderly person, who was 82 years old at the time. Suarez created and mailed dozens of falsified checks from Panama to South Florida to the victim's bank with directions to cash them and return half of the money to his account at Bank of America. The ill-gotten proceeds were wired to his Miami-based company, Online Electronics.
To carry out the scheme, Suarez's fraudulent checks contained forged signatures designed to resemble that of the victim's on a signature card at Truist Bank.
'In total, Suarez and his co-conspirators stole $803,146 from [the victim's] bank account at Truist through the issuance of more than 80 fraudulent checks to numerous different payees, including at least five individuals and various companies,' according to the factual statement signed by the defendant, his lawyer and a prosecutor with the U.S. Attorney's Office in Miami.
The statement also said the elderly person reviewed the names of the individuals and companies involved in the fraudulent check transactions. The person did not authorize any of them.
The case, investigated by the FBI, Secret Service and FDIC's Office of Inspector General, was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Thor Pogozelski.
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TECH CORNER: 'Sam Altman's campaign to keep ChatGPT on top,' by POLITICO's Christine Mui and Chase DiFeliciantonio: 'Sam Altman, the driving force behind ChatGPT's meteoric rise, is running a team of veteran political operatives, campaigning to secure his company OpenAI's future. Only in this case, there's no gray-at-the-temples candidate. … Over the past year alone, the world's most closely watched AI company has hired more than half a dozen political insiders who are well-connected to the Democratic establishment … But it underscores how OpenAI sees its deep-blue home of California as vital for its global ambitions — tied to a planned business makeover that the state's top attorney can summarily shut down.' TALK OF THE TOWN Melania Trump sent a letter to Vladimir Putin calling for peace in Ukraine and the protection of innocent children. SPOTTED: Dan Bongino at the AMC in Georgetown last night. MEDIA MOVE — Claire Heddles is joining the Miami Herald as senior political correspondent. She previously was a fellow at NOTUS. BIPARTISAN WEDDING — Meg Makarewicz, chief of staff to Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.), got married to Mike Rorke, chief of staff to Rep. Tim Walberg (R-Mich.), on Saturday at Saint John's Resort in Plymouth, Michigan. Both Makarewicz and Rorke are proud Michigan grads. Pic, courtesy of Rep. Dingell … Another pic. HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Sen. Dave McCormick (R-Pa.) (6-0) … Jon Lovett of Crooked Media … ABC's Brittany Shepherd … Louisa Terrell … former Sen. Norm Coleman (R-Minn.) … Jamie Gillespie … former Rep. David Price (D-N.C.) … Ron Bonjean of Rokk Solutions … Sonali Dohale … Daniel Penchina … Sabrina Schaeffer of the R Street Institute … Mike Buczkiewicz of 'Morning Joe' … Caroline Boothe Olsen … Philip de Vellis of Beacon Media … Elise Foley … Ben Brody … Fox News' Will Ricciardella … American Trucking Associations' Jessica Gail … Nick Hawatmeh … Andrea Christianson … Diane Shust … Dave Toomey … David Kusnet … Dynamic SRG's Darren Rigger … Rebecca Alcorn of Mindset … Belgian Embassy's Maite Morren … Natalia Latif of New Heights Communications … The Guardian's Ella Creamer Send Playbookers tips to playbook@ or text us on Signal here. Playbook couldn't happen without our editor Zack Stanton, deputy Garrett Ross and Playbook Podcast producer Callan Tansill-Suddath.
