Federal prosecutors charged a New York man with price gouging on Friday, saying he hoarded tens of thousands of masks, hundreds of thousands of disposable gloves and even some full-body isolation suits — and sought to sell them for significantly more than he paid to “uniquely vulnerable populations.”
Amardeep Singh sold 2,000 disposable three-ply face masks to a senior citizens foundation at more than 1300% above the price he paid, and marked up 500 coveted KN-95 respirator masks at 185% above his cost, prosecutors said.
They also said he charged a children’s charity $14.99 for bottles of hand sanitizer he had bought for $8 apiece.
When investigators searched his Long Island warehouse they found he still had more than 20,000 KN-95 masks, 75,000 surgical masks, nearly 2,500 isolation suits, more than 500,000 pairs of disposable gloves and 147 digital thermometers.
“Singh’s amassing of critical personal protective equipment during a public health crisis and reselling at huge markups places him squarely in the cross-hairs of law enforcement armed with the Defense Production Act,” said Richard P. Donoghue, the U.S. attorney for the eastern district of New York.
Mr. Singh normally operates a show and clothing business, but he began to scarf up the gloves, face masks and sanitizer last month as fears of coronavirus began to take hold, according to postal inspectors. All told, he took in 40 shipments of disposable face masks — at a total weight of 1.6 tons. Six shipments of sanitizer weighed 1.8 tons.
Prosecutors charged Mr. Singh under the Defense Production Act, which gives the government powers to control distribution of critical equipment amid an emergency. It specifically bans someone from accumulating too much of that equipment, and further bans resale “in excess of prevailing market prices.”
The Justice Department has been very aggressive in bringing cases during coronavirus, and said this week that it’s disrupted hundreds of scams.
Among them are phony charities seeking to collect money they claim will go to fight the virus, and people offering quack cures.
The U.S. attorney in the northern district of Texas announced Friday that he’d won an order from a court banning a wellness center from offering an “ozone therapy” the owner billed as a treatment for COVID-19.
The owner told an undercover caller that the treatment was safe even for children and would eradicate viral infections. She claimed the treatment was 95% effective for COVID-19, according to prosecutors.
There have also been high-profile cases against people accused of hoarding or thievery.
One man in Nevada was charged with pilfering a couple boxes of surgical masks from his cart at the Veterans Affairs hospital where he worked.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
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