A New Jersey man who posed as a former New England Patriots player in order to buy and sell Super Bowl rings that he claimed were gifts to Tom Brady’s family has now found out his fate.
Scott V. Spina Jr., 25, of Roseland was sentenced by a judge in Southern California’s Orange County. He received three years in federal prison.
Spina Jr. orchestrated and executed a scheme in 2017 that started with defrauding an ex-New England Patriots player, swindling him out of his Super Bowl LI championship ring with a bad check for $63,000. Spina also obtained sensitive information of the ex-NFL player, including a means to purchase what are called “family and friend rings” from the original Super Bowl ring company.
“Spina then called the Ring Company, fraudulently identified himself as [the former player], and started ordering three family and friend Super Bowl LI rings with the name ‘Brady’ engraved on each one, which he falsely represented were gifts for the baby of quarterback Tom Brady,” according to court documents. “Defendant Spina intended to obtain the three rings by fraud and to sell them at a substantial profit.”
Spina tried to sell the three rings to the same Orange County broker to whom he sold the first Super Bowl ring of his scam, but the broker grew suspicious.
Spina then sold the three rings to Golden Auctions, a sports memorabilia dealer based in New Jersey, for $100,000, which Gold Auctions labeled for resale as “authorized by Tom Brady.”
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Spina pleaded guilty on Feb. 1. to one count of mail fraud, three counts of wire fraud and one count of aggravated identity theft for posing as the former Patriots player, falsely telling the broker that the family rings were ordered by Brady and defrauding him in connection with three wire transfers for the deposit.
At his sentencing, the judge also ordered Spina to pay $63,000 in restitution to the former Patriots player who sold him the genuine Super Bowl ring.
