San Diego

Nine men were arrested Thursday after a three-month investigation into an operation in which the men allegedly sold phony high-quality stereo speakers.

The San Diego Police Special Investigations Unit arrested Fredrick Hermann, Ted Nichols and Charles Mulieri--the managers/owners of a company known as Pacific Sound--and confiscated 10 vans and 400 speakers, Lt. W. E. Howell said in a press release. The men were arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to commit fraud and grand theft and are being held at County Jail downtown in lieu of $100,000 bail.

The release said the operators of the company were distributing shoddy speakers advertised as the finest quality. The equipment was sold from vans in shopping center parking lots, on street corners and even at stop lights.

Prospective victims would be contacted by the vans’ drivers, who said an oversight had resulted in extra speakers being placed into their vans at the warehouse, Howell said. The men purportedly told victims that they were willing to part with the speakers supposedly worth more than $800 for only $200.

The drivers would then display a receipt indicating that a well-known local restaurant or nightclub had bought the same speakers for more than $700, Howell said. When the victim got home and tried the speakers, they most often found them to be of inferior quality.

Six drivers were also arrested, but 11 new employees undergoing training were interviewed by police and released.