Miami Heat Heist Suspect Arrested After Allegedly Stealing Hundreds Of Stolen Game Worn Jerseys

Miami Heat Heist Suspect Arrested After Allegedly Stealing Hundreds Of Stolen Game Worn Jerseys

So yesterday the Department of Justice uh they have issued a statement or the US attorney’s office, excuse me, Southern District of Florida, they have issued a statement because they have uh made charges in the heat heist. Did you guys talk about the heat heist at all last week? Yeah, we uh a little bit. So, for those who aren’t caught up, uh, the Miami Heat got heisted for hundreds of stolen items of game used memorabilia that were apparently sold on the black market of memorabilia. And it we’re talking hundreds of jerseys that the Heat, you know, we’re keeping in storage apparently for some kind of potential Heat Hall of Fame or whatever. But, uh, they noticed that I guess these items were stolen. And so the attorney’s office here, they give out the, uh, the statement says, “A former employee of the Miami Heat made his initial appearance in federal court today on one count of information charging him with transporting and transferring stolen goods in interstate commerce.” According to the charging document, Marcos Thomas Perez, 62, of Miami, is accused of stealing millions of dollars worth of Miami Heat gameworn jerseys and other valuable memorabilia, which he later sold to online brokers. Perez is a 25year retired veteran of the city of Miami Police Department, which employed as a security officer with the Miami Heat from 2016 to 2021 and then later worked as an NBA security employee from 2022 to 2025. During his tenure, Perez worked on the game uh worked on the game day security detail at the Cassaya Center, where he was among a limited number of trusted individuals with access to a secured equipment room. This equipment room stored hundreds of gameworn jerseys and other memorabilia that the organization intended to display at a future Miami Heat museum. During his employment, Perez accessed the equipment room multiple times to steal over 400 gameworn jerseys and other items, which he then sold to various online marketplaces. Over a three-year period, he sold over 100 stolen items for approximately $2 million and shipped them across state lines, often for prices well below their market value. As an example, he sold a gameworn LeBron James Miami Heat NBA Finals jersey for approximately $100,000. That same jersey later sold at an auction for $3.7 million. Jeez. So, on April 3rd, law enforment uh law enforcement executed a search warrant at his residence and seized nearly 300 additional stolen gameworn jerseys and memorabilia. The Miami Heat confirmed that these items have been stolen from their facility. So, here’s the kicker. You know why they keep saying interstate lines? Yeah, because he’s selling them to other states, I’d imagine. No, that makes it federal. Okay. So, that’s why they keep saying that. Yeah, when it’s federal. Because that makes it federal. Well, if you did sell it to somebody else though, that does like I mean Yeah, but still like it’s that’s crazy. I mean, I’m still trying 400 jerseys. Nobody noticed those things were missing. What did he like Well, do you think like he put like a Get them out. Maybe he like he did a switcheroo cuz on every good heist movie there’s a switcheroo, you know? So maybe he replaced him with like a TJ Maxx LeBron so it weighed the same. T-Mu LeBron. Talk about if you’re going to try. You’re going to try to imposter a real gameworn jersey. You’re not going to teach. Well, no, no, no. So you think he’s going You think like he gets an actual authentic jersey? Like you think he buys like the $300 authentic jersey and tries to put that back in. The closest ripoff to it like the the the like the the Canal Street version of the NBA real jersey, but they’re not going to TJ. I don’t know. Come on. I Well, so like something had to set it off where they’re like, “Wait a minute. This isn’t this is like what why is the James spelled with a lowercase?” Like there had to be something that like sparked everybody. Why is there an I? Yeah. Why? Why? Like what sets this off that it was noticed that he were like s like do you think they finally were putting the plans together for this for this museum and they’re like hey wait a minute what is this? That is hysterical. That’s crazy. Dude, you think he just puts like an NBA patch like instead of a patch it’s just a sticker? Yeah. Is it raining by you guys? I don’t know if you heard the thundering, but yeah, by me. Not yet. Clear skies over here. It’s It’s loud. Yeah, it’s them big drops. So, do you think like he was bold enough to like go to I mean that’s Dude, he’s got some Oh, yeah. major for that, bro. Like that’s crazy. What do you think he did? Especially the Heat. Like, and he been working there in some capacity for like 10 years, right? Yeah. Everybody probably trusted him, you know? Oh, they’re probably just like, “Hey, there’s What the hell is the guy’s name? There’s Marcos. It’s always a Marcos.” Always a Marcos, dude. There’s always a Marcos. You think like he puts on the jersey and then puts back on the security outfit or do you think he puts it in You think he puts it in a bag? He’s got to put it in a bag. I think he puts on the jersey. You put on a jersey like you’re taking away the authenticity of the jersey cuz I don’t think he cares. It’s a He wants a No one’s going to know. It’s a gameworn jersey. Put it this way. If it wasn’t gameworn, it’s not going to have the same value. But the fact you ain’t selling You ain’t selling a regular jersey for 3.7. That’s what I’m saying. You’re selling a gameworn jersey for 3.7. If you’re selling heisted material, do you think they’re asking a lot of questions? No, you don’t care. You don’t want They don’t care. All they care about is if if it’s authentic or not. Yeah. So, he’s probably wearing the jersey and then putting his uniform back on top of it. Wow. Somebody said that was Thunder was it was Haime’s bubble gut. Yeah, that’s how like every good every good heist movie has a switcheroo, Leroy. Yeah, they always do the switcheroo. You have you have to have an extra bag that like that’s similar to the original bag. You have to have something that’s similar. So when you do the the switcheroo, they’re all uh before but usually usually usually in these situations there’s never anybody who has that much access to the items, right? So, he was well trusted. No, he was I mean, if you’re if you not only were an NBA a Miami Heat security guard, but then got hired by the league, right? Yeah. Obviously, the guy was trusted, but he he got screed. Here’s what sucks about it, what sucks about all this is nobody cares about the money as much as they care about the item, and some of those things are gone. Well, yeah. I mean, I guess the good thing is I imagine if they seize those items, I guess the Heat get to get a lot of them back. But no, this is crazy. That happened with Joe Budro with like a lot of his stuff that got stolen from his house. People like uh they had to uh they were able to find it from pawn shops. But this is uh Do you think anybody was looking? They’re like, do you think that that the the LeBron jersey selling for nearly $4 million? Somebody had to be like, “Oh, I wonder where they got that game used. Huh?” And then Carl goes to the equipment room and he goes, “They’ve all been replaced by Terrell Harris jerseys. What? Not the demonstration. The guy that stole it is going to act like shock when he’s like, “Oh my god, it’s been robbed.” I think that he goes into I don’t know who it is. I don’t know if it’s like Eric Woolworth’s office, you know? I don’t know if he goes straight to Pat Riley. He goes, “Mr. President, all the jerseys, all the LeBron jerseys are now Rooney Turoffs.” In the documentary, you see her running through the hallway. Man, there has to be some guy. Like Carl is doing like spring cleaning and he’s like checking on all the jerseys and he goes he’s like, “Yeah, man.” I don’t think they even check them. I think sometimes you put stuff in storage, you don’t realize it’s gone until you’re going to use them. And he goes, he goes, “Hey, hey, uh, Lance, you notice we have a lot of Greg Odens and not a lot of LeBron’s.” I mean, it’s it’s like all that stuff is insured. But again, these people have so much money. It’s not about the money. It’s about the items. like the Heat. Having a autographed LeBron jersey to put on display is more important to the Heat organization than having the 3.7 million that is sold for. Oh yeah. It’s it’s about the item, right? It’s like if you have the LeBron if I have the LeBron James the cramp game jersey, you know, where he where he hits the uh the the the three ball game four against the Thunder, you know, what are those? two because he probably wears two jerseys a game. Who wears you think he wears two jerseys a game? I know Jimmy does. Unless they dry clean one jersey during uh during the halftime. No, they I don’t know if they wear two. I’ve I’ve worn two jerseys before. Some guys are sweaters. They bring a football jersey football jersey is a pain in the ass, isn’t it? Because you got to put over shoulder pads. Yeah, but you put you put the um you have to have help too because it’s tight. But no, so I remember when we were going to play Kansas City and it flooded to the fact where we had to walk through water to get through locker room because when you go to in Kansas City when you go to locker room it’s like a dugout. So you go down and then up. So all that was flooded and we had to just go through it and we all change uniforms. Well, remember how crazy it was? Was it like Brady’s last Super Bowl with the Patriots? Remember how crazy it was because they got one because that jersey got stolen? They damn near sent out this the uh they sent damn near the whole SWAT team to go get that. And that was right after the game. This guy had 400 jerseys. Wow. What if the guy gets there in the war and go and you think you think he tries to broker a deal and he goes, “Listen, I didn’t want to say anything.” All right. You can take me down or I can give you the game one Gorandra from the bubble from the bubble finals. What say you? What say you? Huh? You would fold. You would fold. I’d be like, nah. All right. Whatever you say, Officer Perez. I love Officer Perez. That’s crazy though. Like it’s not That’s not a heist, right? That is a heist. I mean, it is, but it’s a slow rolling heist. You know how much that jerseys he could sell that for? No, he sold it for he sold it for 100 grand and then it resold for 3.7 million. That’s a heist. All right. Anything that Well, they’re saying that he’s did it multiple times. So, if he did this I mean hundreds of thousands once can turn in they’re they’re just saying that they just put that in the press release as the example. They’re saying here’s the problem. They’re saying he sold it uh that his selling went in total of over $2 million. Here’s the problem with all this. You ready? If you’re going to take a bunch of items. Yep. You got to get them off your hands quick, right? Just in case they come over to your house, right? The fact that he still had 300 jerseys left and this is from years of stuff. How when did this happen? this year or a couple years ago. It said it went He said he was employed by the NBA last year. So, depending on when he did it, right, if you going to take something, the last thing you want in your house is evidence. What do you think the first time that he got the codes were? Do you think like some guy’s like, you know, I really like Josh McRoberts? I got one for you, Thomas. Here, take one. And then he’s like he like matched the thumbrint. fingers. Perfect. Now I can get it whenever I want. Stupid idiot. Thought that I wanted a Mc Robert’s jersey. Oh, wait. You’re figuring out he’s got a little piece of tape. He’s taping the fingerprint. I think he’s going She’s like spraying the So why you you kind of like mission impossible, right? But here’s the here’s the problem. Shouldn’t he know better as a cop that if you take something, you don’t have it just stored in your house? I guess you have a side house or a stash house or something like that. No, he’s got to show off. You gota have a You got to have a unit or something. He’s a police officer though. Every heist show off. Every heist Well, he wasn’t a police officer anymore. He was the heat. He knows the tricks of the trade, man. Another guy. You can’t be You can’t be a You can’t be a police officer. This is no lie. You cannot be a police officer and get caught with the stuff you stole in your house. That like that’s just that’s just greedy.

Tobin and Leroy give their thoughts on the arrest made in the Miami Heat heist of hundreds of game worn jerseys stolen from the Heat arena and sold to dealers.