Multiple credit card skimmers discovered at Delaware Dollar General locations
DELAWARE – Delaware shoppers should be on the lookout after credit card skimming devices were found at multiple Dollar General locations in the past week.
Sunday morning, the Georgetown police department announced they had recovered a credit card skimming device from the dollar general on East Market Street.
“It takes no time to place these things on there. Typically two people, you get somebody to distract the the main associate, and then another person just snaps a device over top of the the other one,” said Lt. Joel Diaz of the Georgetown Police Department, “It is typically placed over top of the original credit card machine, mimicking the machine itself. A lot of times it’s difficult to tell unless you’re really paying attention.”
This came after another skimming device was discovered at a Dollar General in Felton on Thursday. “So we’re communicating with our partners in law enforcement to determine if this is isolated or if this is something specific to dollar generals. And if that’s the case, then why,” said Lt. Diaz.
Felton Police Chief Christopher Guild said these incidents–at the same chain–certainly could be connected, but its too soon to say for sure: “I mean, it very well could be. A lot of times, you know, that is the case. But it’s really too early in this investigation to be able to determine that right now.”
In both cases, police said they’re still working on identifying suspects, as they’re still in the process of obtaining surveillance footage. Chief Guild said, “They do have surveillance footage of the their cash registers and of their checkout area. So, hopefully that will give us some type of lead to go with.”
Lt. Diaz said that these cases of fraud can be difficult to track because it might not show itself right away: “So the complexity is, six months from now, customers get fraudulent information on their accounts and they they don’t know when, or where, or how it happened.”
The Felton Police Department is now working with the Secret Service and the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office in Pennsylvania, because those agencies have forensic experts that specialize in cases like these.
Georgetown Police have reached out to their community partners, asking them to remain vigilant and perform regular checks of their checkout devices.
WMDT reached out to Dollar General for comment, but did not receive a response.
