Issue date: 12/6/07 Section: Breaking News

Media Credit: Cody Duty Melvin Griggs, 20, was arrested Monday at Southwest Hall on charges of identity theft.

A student in Southwest Hall was arrested Monday on charges of identity theft.

Melvin Griggs, 20, a freshman from Memphis, Tenn., was being held at the Warren County Regional Jail on a $10,000 cash bond as of Monday night.

A fraud investigator from Howard Beach, N.Y., contacted Western's network and computing support department on Nov. 8 to report that a Western IP address had been used for fraudulent activity, according to a police report. The investigator, Michael Sagginaro, works for videogamecentral.com.

Sagginaro said he had been tracking the user since May.

Videogamecentral.com employees started investigating a few successful fraudulent charges when customers started complaining that they had been charged for things they hadn't bought. There have been eight claims connected to Griggs's IP address, he said.

Videogamecentral.com authorities suspect that Griggs knew he was being investigated because his last purchase was sophisticated, Sagginaro said.

The user somehow stole credit card information, set up a PayPal account online and used the account to buy Xbox games and accessories from videogamecentral.com, Sagginaro said.

The user shipped his mail express and ordered with a different account every time to avoid detection, he said.

Sagginaro said he gave the user made-up tracking information so that he e-mailed the company with information that could be connected to him when his order didn't arrive.

Videogamecentral.com employees noticed about a month ago, at the time of his last fraudulent order, that the user had changed IP addresses and that the new IP address could be traced to Western, he said.

Sagginaro said authorities started investigating when the company's customer service representatives called a customer to find out where to ship an Xbox Intercooler that had been billed to that identity.

"That's when the customer called back and said, 'What's an Xbox?'" he said.

Sagginaro said he suspects that Griggs tricked people into giving him their personal information some way because the victims had nothing in common and came from various parts of the country.

Names the user submitted to videogamecentral.com included Malvon Griggs, Melvin Griggs and Melvin Griggs II, he said. He later used victims' names.

Campus police officers and Secret Service agents have executed a search warrant for Griggs' room, said Mike Dowell, public information officer for campus police. They'll seize computers and other materials to look for electronic evidence.

More charges could result from the search, Dowell said.

Information technology representatives and Secret Service argents will shut down those computers to preserve evidence, he said.

Secret Service agents sometimes get involved in identity theft investigations because the crime carries state and federal charges, Dowell said.

Identity theft is a class D felony, and it is punishable by one to five years in a state prison.

Check wkuherald.com for updates on this story.

Reach Amber Coulter at news@chherald.com.