Bereket Abraham, co-owner of CoolKicks, just got indicted in a pretty wild federal case. He's accused of being part of a group that stole Nike shoes from a warehouse in Memphis. Eleven other people are named in the same indictment alongside him.
The alleged scheme reportedly ran for a few years, from 2021 to 2024. We're talking over $2 million worth of stolen Nike product. According to prosecutors, the group used fake shipping labels to redirect shipments before reselling everything.
Online reseller Jorge Cuellar, who a lot of people know as "horehead_sales," is facing the same charge. Authorities say he and Abraham paid close to $900,000 for the stolen shoes. A third guy, Roy Harvey Jr., is also named in the case.
Funny enough, it sounds like a snowstorm is partly what blew this whole thing open. Nike reportedly noticed something off with mislabeled packages during shipping delays, and that led investigators right back to CoolKicks.
Since the news broke, CoolKicks has already cut ties with Abraham. The store says he's denying the charges, and that the indictment doesn't accuse the business itself of anything. Still, this isn't a great look, especially since CoolKicks already had legal trouble last year when co-owner Adeel Shams got arrested over separate stolen goods claims.
Now it's just a matter of watching how this plays out in court.
CoolKicks Co-Owner Indicted
According to the indictment, people inside the warehouse would flag the shoes worth grabbing. From there, those items allegedly got rerouted using fake shipping labels tied to CoolKicks.
Prosecutors say those labels sent shipments straight to pickup spots across the country. Once they landed, alleged co-conspirators would grab the boxes and flip them for profit. This is where it gets interesting for anyone into sneaker culture.
Investigators eventually planted tracking devices inside some of the shipments to see where they'd end up. Sure enough, those trackers reportedly led straight back to CoolKicks.
If convicted, Abraham and Cuellar could each be looking at up to 15 years behind bars. On top of that, they could face fines as high as $500,000, plus supervised release. It took a joint effort between LAPD and the FBI to actually crack this case open.
