Auto Parts Store Owner Accused of Credit Card Theft

In two separate stories, a young street racer who wants to soup up his import but can’t afford the parts allegedly is led into a world of crime by a parts dealer.

One story was the plot of last year’s movie “The Fast and the Furious.” The other is the outline of a case in which prosecutors allege an auto parts store owner in Canoga Park lured young street racers into credit card theft.

The case brought by the U.S. attorney’s office in Los Angeles and scheduled to go before a federal grand jury next week alleges that Maneli Pourkhani, 28, co-owner of Dynamic Design, enlisted young customers to use stolen card numbers to help him buy computer equipment.

Pourkhani, charged last week with credit card theft, was released on $75,000 bond and placed under a 10 p.m. to 7 a.m. curfew.

Also charged, but not arrested, were Gilberto Carrillo, 21, of Reseda, and Jimmy Pezzulo, 22, and Scott Needham, 22, both of Thousand Oaks.

An affidavit from a Secret Service special agent, which provides the basis for the federal charges, states that Carrillo, a waiter at the Market Broiler restaurant in Tarzana, stole numbers from 18 customer credit cards between November and last month.

The cards were later used, the affidavit states, to buy laptop computers and other electronics from Best Buy stores in Thousand Oaks and Woodland Hills, where Pezzulo and Needham worked.

The three men allegedly told Secret Service investigators that they were recruited by Pourkhani--known on the street as “Money Levin,” according to the affidavit--when they bought pricey wheels and other equipment from him.

Stolen credit card numbers in a notebook seized at Dynamic Design were used to buy $250,000 in goods, the affidavit states.

It was not the amount of money involved but the similarity to “The Fast and the Furious” plot that struck the prosecutor, Assistant U.S. Atty. Chris Johnson.

“That movie looked at the underground street-racing cult,” said Johnson, who normally prosecutes computer hackers but chose this case. “Racing takes high-value items not easily within the means of most of the younger generation of 18- to 25-year-olds. The movie involved the owner of this high-performance auto store, just like Pourkhani.”

Johnson said others in the San Fernando Valley’s street-racing scene may be involved, but he would not say how widespread credit card theft in the street-racing community might be.

A study of computers seized from Dynamic Design could lead investigators to other racers, he said. A search of the store and Pourkhani’s car yielded more than 500 stolen card numbers and a .45-caliber pistol, according to the affidavit.

Pourkhani refused to comment.

Rosemarie Kitchin, spokeswoman for the Specialty Equipment Market Assn., said retailers know their products are a bit expensive for their customers, 72% of whom are between 16 and 25 years old. But most customers live with their parents and use their earnings for amping up their cars.

That one person is charged with preying “on gullible young people’s desire to have the best car on the block or in the school parking lot does not make it typical of the industry,” Kitchin said.

“This is the first case like this that I have ever heard other than ‘The Fast and the Furious,’ but that’s just a movie.”

Since the movie’s release, the $1.5-billion industry has experienced a record-high product demand, Kitchin said.