Thousands of Americans Fall Prey to Mexican Cartel Timeshare Scam Steve Fisher - Courier Journal
go to original February 22, 2024

Timeshare owner loses more than $300,000 in elaborate scam (CBS Chicago)

According to a U.S, government investigation, over the last decade, thousands of Americans — many of them elderly - have fallen prey to a complex scheme involving one of Mexico’s most violent cartels.

In timeshares, the cartel has found a business venture whose profits, U.S. government officials believe, now rival the business it is most known for: drug trafficking.

The Jalisco New Generation Cartel, commonly known as CJNG, started its timeshare fraud business in Puerto Vallarta and has now largely taken over the Cancu´n timeshare market as well. It has expanded the fraud network to at least two dozen call centers that contact owners of property in those two cities, as well as other areas popular with North American retirees, including Acapulco.

Buying into a few weeks of a condo is seemingly hawked on every corner in many Mexican resort towns, and people on vacation buy in, only to find later that they’re paying for time they don’t use and are looking to sell.

“You have these people that are desperate,” said Brian Rogers, head of consumer advocacy nonprofit, called Timeshare Users Group, which provides information on how to avoid scams. “The victims are limitless.”

Based on their investigation, a U.S. government official estimates the fraud from Mexico-based companies at hundreds of millions of dollars a year.

“It’s more cash in hand than they make from drugs,” said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “The overhead is really low for this.”

Few of the telemarketing firms have been criminally charged, partly because the business shape-shifts, abandoning shell companies and bank accounts as authorities identify them, then quickly creating new ones.

The U.S. Treasury department has sanctioned 40 Mexican companies associated with the Jalisco cartel and its telemarketing scam. But few people have been arrested.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation has received an average of 1,400 complaints per year, related to timeshare fraud from Mexico, over the past five years. And more people are reporting timeshare fraud every year.

Read the rest at Courier Journal

Related: U.S. Examined Allegations of Cartel Ties to Allies of Mexico’s President (The New York Times)

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