NICE TRY

Scammer Pretended to Be Patriots Player to Get Super Bowl Rings With Brady Engravings

The elaborate ruse began when the man scammed a former New England Patriots player out of his keepsake.

A New Jersey man has admitted to pretending to be a New England Patriots players to get his hands on three Super Bowl rings that he had engraved with Tom Brady’s name before selling them for $100,000. According to NBC News, the elaborate scam began in 2017, when Scott Spina, 24, scammed a former Patriots player—only identified in court documents as T.J.—out of his Super Bowl 51 ring. The ring came with the player’s username and password for the company that sells Super Bowl rings, allowing Spina to order more of them. Posing as the player, Spina ordered three family versions of the Super Bowl ring with the name “Brady” engraved on them, fraudulently telling the company that he was going to gift them to the quarterback’s baby. Spina offloaded the rings to an auction house for $100,000, and one ring later sold for $337,219, according to court documents. The case was investigated by the FBI’s art crime team, and, on Monday, Spina pleaded guilty to fraud and identify theft.