Cops: Alleged Lego Scammer Sold 2,100 Boxes Through Website - East Idaho News
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Cops: Alleged Lego Scammer Sold 2,100 Boxes Through Website

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GETTY W 113011 Lego?  SQUARESPACE CACHEVERSION=1337871818965Vladimir Weiss/Bloomberg via Getty Images(SANTA CLARA, Calif.) — The California software exec arrested for allegedly switching bar codes on high priced Lego sets resold them online through “TomsBrickyard,” a site so popular with Lego buyers that they rated his service “excellent.”

Thomas Langenbach, who was the vice president of SAP Labs Integration and Certification Center in Palo Alto, was arrested on May 8 outside a Mountain View Target store.

Police say he used a home computer and printer — and lots of Legos — to amass a small fortune reselling the toys.

“Believe it or not this will be our first tech exec in a Lego case,” Police Chief Scott Vermeer told ABC News.

Lagenbach, who lives in a gated multi-million dollar home in San Carlos, Calif., is free on $10,000 bail, but has refused to comment.

Police said that Lagenbach, 47, was repeatedly captured on store surveillance video with expensive Lego sets in his cart at retail stores.  Detectives said he did something called a “ticket switch,” changing the price by allegedly putting his own barcode stickers on boxes so he could pay less.  He then resold the sets through the TomsBrickyard website, according to police. 

Prosecutors said he sold 2,100 Lego items for roughly $30,000 over the last year.  Police are investigating to determine how many of those sets were obtained through fraudulent bar codes.

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