Opioid addicts stole stuff from Home Depot, Target, and CVS, and hauled it to a secondhand store called Ace Amusements Kimberly Avenue, where George J. Connelly and co-owner Paul Muzyka would pay them one-third the retail price.
Connelly and Muzyka would resell some the merchandise in their store. They’d resell some of it online.
They sold the rest to middlemen, partners in crime like William Reidell, who would then resell it on eBay. Reidell and other middlemen grossed at least $1.5 million in such sales from eBay.
That went on a long time. From 2007 to 2016.
Then the feds arrested Connelly, Muzyka, and Reidell.
Connelly and Muzyka went on trial. On Wedensday a federal jury found them guilty of interstate transport of stolen property. Connelly faces up to 20 years in prison and Muzyka up to 10 at their as-yet unscheduled sentencing. (The jury found Connelly on one count.)
Muzyka pleaded guilty in March to conspiracy to commit the interstate transport of stolen property and to interstate transport of stolen propprty. He, too, has yet to be sentenced.
Paul Bass File Photo
Prosecutor Huang (at left in photo).
Assistant U.S. Attorneys John T. Pierpont, Jr. and David T. Huang prosecuted the case.
State and local cops had earlier busted this operation in 2010.