Four men from Chile have been charged in an ongoing investigation of nationwide burglaries at the homes of the rich and sometimes famous, according to court documents.
The four have been linked to a Dec. 9 burglary in Hamilton County, Ohio, authorities say in the filing, a time and place that coincide with a break-in at the home of Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow. Though the documents did not name Burrow as a victim, a Bengals hat allegedly stolen during that December break-in was spotted by detectives in an SUV used by the suspects, the documents say.
Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost announced that a grand jury returned an indictment against the four in court Tuesday. It includes charges of corrupt activity, participation in a criminal gang and possessing burglary tools, according to a statement. He credited the Southwest Ohio Burglary Task Force, which his office launched last year to investigate the break-ins.
A spokesperson for Yost said the indictment was returned at a preliminary hearing at which the defendants did not enter pleas. Ohio criminal procedure does not require pleas to be entered for felony cases at such hearings.
The original criminal complaint includes those charges, as well as obstructing investigators, according to the local case filed in Springfield municipal court on Jan. 13. Authorities alleged in the filing that three of the four presented fake identification to police.
Investigators say an LSU football shirt believed to have been taken in the Dec. 9 burglary was also spotted in the Chevrolet SUV after Ohio State Police stopped it on Interstate 70 on Jan. 10 during an investigation of the burglaries, according to the initial filings. Burrow graduated from Louisiana State University, where he played his final two seasons of college football.
A cellphone one of the four, Bastian Alejandro Morales, 23, was alleged to possess was determined to have been in the area of the Dec. 9 home burglary, and he was previously spotted in a Volkswagen SUV seen in the area of the burglary, investigators said in the Jan. 13 court documents.
Burrow's home in Anderson Township had been ransacked on that date, the Hamilton County Sheriff's Office reported. At the time, Burrow was in Arlington, Texas, where he played in his team's win against the Dallas Cowboys.
Burrow's agent and the Bengals did not immediately respond to requests for comment Tuesday night.
In the fall, the NFL and the NBA, the latter citing FBI intelligence, warned professional athletes and their employers about what the NBA described as “transnational South American Theft Groups” targeting “professional athletes and other high-net-worth individuals.”
Since the start of 2024, athletes who have been victimized by residential break-ins include Burrow, Kansas City Chiefs stars Travis Kelce and Patrick Mahomes, Milwaukee Bucks forward Bobby Portis Jr., Dallas Mavericks guard Luka Dončić and the fiancée of Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott.
The stars' locations are often matters of public record, with even publicized home games indicating they're not really at home.
The four suspects, arrested and booked into Clark County Jail, were identified as Morales; Sergio Andres Cabello, 38; Jordan Francisco Sanchez, 22; and Alejandro Esteban Huaiquil-Chavez, 24. The documents described all of them as Chileans who were alleged to have "overstayed their permissions."
They were initially detained for being in the country illegally, authorities said in the documents. All were in custody with no bail listed Tuesday evening, according to inmate records. All four have pleaded not guilty to the initial charges, court records show.
It is not clear whether they have retained counsel. The public defender's office in Clark County did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Todd Spitzer, the district attorney in Orange County, California, has blamed some of the crimes committed by Chileans on U.S. soil on the automated Electronic System for Travel Authorization (ESTA), which clears visitors for 90-day passes under the Visa Waiver Program, granting citizens of 42 nations permission to enter and stay with relative ease.
“For the last 18 months, I have been sounding the alarm about a dangerous loophole in the ESTA Visa Waiver program that is being exploited by organized crime rings from Chile to enter the United States unlimited times over a two-year period without background checks,” Spitzer said last month.
"These criminals aren’t coming to the United States to visit Disneyland," he said by email.
Though investigators have not directly alleged the four Ohio defendants were involved in any of the nationwide burglaries that have victimized wealthy people, star athletes and some celebrities, the criminal complaint based on a narrative by Clark County Sheriff's Detective Brian Melchi said the suspects were targeted as part of “an ongoing investigation involving burglaries of multi-million dollar homes in multiple states."
The Ohio State Highway Patrol traffic stop of the SUV carrying the defendants on Jan. 10 took place after they had stayed in a hotel in Fairfield, according to the criminal complaint, which made it clear they had been under surveillance.
Inside the SUV, investigators said in court documents, was the smell of marijuana, as well as two Husky tools used to punch windows often found in the possession of South American burglars.
The cellphone alleged to have been in Morales' possession and linked to the area of the Dec. 9 burglary came to the attention of investigators searching the Chevrolet Blazer when one of the detectives called a "target" number known to the investigation and the device alleged to belong to Morales lit up, according to the complaint.
"Investigators have arrested at least six different South American burglary groups, five of which were Chilean," the filing says.
NBC affiliate WLWT of Cincinnati, which accessed the court documents, reported that, to its knowledge, Burrow’s was the only multimillion-dollar home burglarized in Hamilton County on Dec. 9.
