06-08-2025
Former Miami Heat employee charged for stealing $3.7 million LeBron jersey, hundreds of other items
Former Miami Heat security officer Marcos Thomas Perez faced federal charges of transporting and transferring stolen goods in interstate commerce on Tuesday, according to a press release from the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida. The 62-year-old retired member of the Miami Police Department is accused of stealing hundreds of items from the team, including LeBron James' jersey from Game 7 of the 2013 NBA Finals, which went on to sell for nearly $3.7 million in a 2023 Sotheby's auction.
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Perez was employed by the Heat from 2016-2021 and later by the NBA from 2022-2025, according to the U.S. Attorney's office.
'During his tenure, Perez worked on the game-day security detail at the Kaseya Center, where he was among a limited number of trusted individuals with access to a secured equipment room,' the release says. 'This equipment room stored hundreds of game-worn jerseys and other memorabilia that the organization intended to display in a future Miami Heat museum.'
Perez allegedly stole more than 400 game-used jerseys and other items from the equipment room, selling them on multiple online marketplaces. Law enforcement executed a search warrant at Perez's home in April and seized almost 300 items that the Heat confirmed had been stolen from their arena.
'Over a three-year period, Perez sold over 100 stolen items for approximately $2 million and shipped them across state lines, often for prices well below their market value,' the press release says, including the James Game 7 jersey for about $100,000. That same jersey went on to sell for $3.68 million in a highly publicized Sotheby's auction in January 2023. At the time, it was the third most ever paid for a game-used jersey behind Michael Jordan's 1998 NBA Finals Game 1 'Last Dance' jersey ($10.091 million) and Diego Maradona's 1986 World Cup 'Hand of God' jersey ($9.28 million).
'Sotheby's is fully cooperating with law enforcement and, out of respect for the ongoing investigation, will not comment further at this time,' the auction said on Tuesday.
The charges are reminiscent of those faced by former Augusta National employee Richard Brendan Globensky, who pled guilty to stealing items worth an estimated $5.3 million from the country club, including Arnold Palmer's green jacket, which was intercepted in an FBI sting operation in 2022. Globensky received a 12-month prison sentence in March.
(Photo of LeBron James' 2013 NBA Finals Game 7 jersey displayed by Sotheby's in 2023: ANGELA WEISS/AFP via Getty Images)
