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Man Arrested For Illegally Selling Theme Park Tickets

Posted: 6:52 am EST February 20, 2004

A man will appear in court Friday, after police say they busted him for cheating tourists. Detectives say the man would sell expired theme park tickets that were bought with a fraudulent credit card.

Investigators think Gustavo Vargas didn't act alone when he allegedly scammed tourists and theme parks out of thousands of dollars. In fact, investigators say they expect to make more arrests in the coming days.

Vargas was busted Thursday night at a sporting goods store located on International Drive. Investigators say Vargas was illegally selling discounted attraction tickets from the store to tourists for at least the past seven months, possibly even years.

Vargas is accused of buying a large batch of multi-day passes to Disney, Universal and SeaWorld with fraudulent credit cards, with the intent to sell those tickets before unsuspecting credit card holders, their banks and the theme parks found out about it.

"There's a lot of people involved in this stuff. Sometimes you arrest one crew and they're gone for a few months. Then another crew comes out and they're doing it," says Tom Beeson, Orlando Police Department.

Investigators charged Gustavo Vargas with racketeering, dealing in stolen property and running a scheme to defraud.
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