Eight individuals have been charged in an international cargo theft conspiracy that allegedly stole at least $10 million worth of merchandise from commercial shippers across the United States.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York and the FBI announced the unsealing of an Indictment against Vagan Gulian, Zhirayr Gumruyan, Sevak Kocharian, Araik Setrakian, Vitaly Koshelan, Arkadiy Pastin, Jashanpreet Singh, and Edgar Bezhanian. The alleged Cargo Theft Enterprise operated from March 2023, targeting high-value goods such as electronics, liquor, meat, and cryptocurrency mining machines.
The scheme involved members fraudulently impersonating legitimate shipping carriers to obtain contracts, diverting trucks from their intended destinations, altering shipping paperwork, and removing geolocation tracking devices. Once diverted, the stolen merchandise was offloaded and sold on the black market, often to co-conspirators known as “fences.”
U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton said, “As alleged, the defendants were members of a sophisticated, international enterprise whose members stole millions of dollars’ worth of merchandise and sold those stolen goods on the black market.” FBI Assistant Director in Charge James C. Barnacle, Jr. added that the defendants were part of “an international network to steal merchandise and resell these stolen goods at the direct expense of sellers, shippers, and buyers.”
Most defendants were arrested across California, Florida, Pennsylvania, and New York, with Edgar Bezhanian currently at large. Sevak Kocharian faces an additional charge of conspiracy to commit extortion. All defendants are charged with conspiracy to transport and possess stolen merchandise, which carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison.
Law enforcement agencies, including the FBI’s Eurasian Organized Crime Task Force, the NYPD, and Homeland Security Investigations, contributed to the investigation, demonstrating a coordinated response to combat organized crime in supply chains.