ST. LOUIS – Two men from Venezuela have been indicted and accused of stealing tens of thousands of dollars from hacked ATMs in Missouri.
Berny Alberson Meza-Rojas, 22, and Anthony Brijan Sorondo, 31, were each indicted June 4, 2025, with one count of conspiracy to commit bank larceny. They appeared in U.S. District Court in St. Louis Friday and pleaded not guilty to the charge.
The indictment accuses the men’s co-conspirators of tampering with the ATMs so that they could take control and cause the ATMs to dispense substantial amounts of money.
On March 27, 2025, Sorondo, Meza-Rojas and others took more than $11,000 from ATMs in Bloomsdale and Herculaneum.
From March 29 to March 30, they took more than $70,000 from ATMs in O’Fallon, Festus, Ste. Genevieve and Cape Girardeau, the indictment says.
A motion seeking to have both men remain in jail until trial says they are from Venezuela but entered the United States illegally. They also have been linked to jackpotting incidents in Iowa and Kentucky, the motion says.
The conspiracy charge carries a potential penalty of up to five years in prison, a $250,000 fine, or both prison and a fine.
A charge set forth in an indictment is merely an accusation and does not constitute proof of guilt. Every defendant is presumed to be innocent unless and until proven guilty.
The case was investigated by the FBI, Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations, police departments in O’Fallon, Cape Girardeau, Festus, St. Charles County and Ste. Genevieve and the Ste. Genevieve County Sheriff’s Office. Assistant U.S. Attorney Justin Ladendorf is prosecuting the case.