VENTURA : Wife Arrested in Use of Credit Cards

A former organizer of Ventura’s Fiesta Del Sol was arrested after she allegedly stole her estranged husband’s credit cards and used them to purchase about $2,000 worth of jewelry and clothing from a home shopping television show, authorities said Friday.

Sandie Moore, 47, was arrested on suspicion of theft and forgery on Wednesday, said Ventura County Sheriff’s Detective Bill Stovall.

Moore apparently took two credit cards from her estranged husband, Dalton L. Hoffman, when she visited his house one day, Stovall said. Moore and Hoffman are planning to divorce, he said.

Hoffman, a Camarillo doctor, believed he had lost his credit cards and notified police. In the meantime, Stovall said, Moore began ordering products from a televised home shopping show with the credit cards.

The products were supposed to be delivered to the address on the card, which is Hoffman’s business address. Instead, Moore called UPS employees and asked them to hold the packages at their Thousand Oaks office so she could pick them up, Stovall said.

When she picked up the first group of about six packages, she apparently took some medical supplies her husband had ordered as well, Stovall said. Hoffman became puzzled when the supplies failed to arrive and called UPS officials, who described the woman who had been picking up the packages, the detective said.

Hoffman informed the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department, which investigated the matter. Plainclothes detectives arrested Moore when she arranged to pick up another package of goods on Wednesday. She was released on her own recognizance, Stovall said.

Neither Moore nor Hoffman could be reached for comment.