Indictment: Two people stole $75,000 in sports cards from Kentucky, Tennessee shops
A federal grand jury has charged two men with stealing more than $75,000 worth of sports cards from businesses in Kentucky and Tennessee.
Coy Lee Best and Thomas Z. Kasemeyer face charges of conspiracy and interstate transportation of stolen goods.
The indictment charges that in May 2021, Kasemeyer used a hammer to smash out the glass door at a sports card business in Knoxville and stole baseball and basketball cards valued at more than $30,000.
Best waited outside and served as the driver, according to the indictment.
The two allegedly sold the cards to a store in Corbin.
The indictment said the two then burglarized a store near Nashville on Christmas Eve last year and stole more than $30,000 worth of football and basketball cards.
When they tried to sell the cards in Corbin, the manager of the store refused to buy them, so they sold them to a shop in St. Paul, Virginia, the indictment said.
The two also allegedly stole more than $10,000 worth of cards from a store in Montgomery County and cards valued at more than $5,000 from a store in Lexington in January.
They sold most of the cards stolen in Lexington, including an autographed card of Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow, to a store in Lenoir City, Tenn., the indictment charges.
The indictment didn’t say where the two suspects were from.
The indictment did not list the names of stores burglarized as part of the scheme or the stores that bought cards, though it referred to the buyers as “unwitting businesses.”
The conspiracy charge is punishable by up to five years in prison and the interstate transportation charge has a top sentence of 10 years in prison.
