Three men in Russia were reportedly arrested after stealing 20 Nvidia RTX 3070 TIs from a suburban warehouse. While they successfully made off with the video cards, a haul worth nearly $38,000 USD, they were arrested after trying to sell them to local pawn shops.
As reported by Videocardz.com via Mash, the three suspects were apparently employees who worked at the Wildberries warehouse in Podolsk, Russia. They allegedly broke into the warehouse’s storage area by pretending to be collecting an online order. Eventually, the men reached a window in the warehouse and stopped here to open it and chuck the video cards down to another member of the crew.
The entire operation, which went rather smoothly, all things considered, was captured on multiple security cameras in the facility. Footage of the heist was uploaded to Mash where it has racked up over 1 million views as of March 19.
Reportedly, things went less smoothly for the thieves after getting the video cards out of the warehouse. The trio tried to sell the highly sought-after video cards at pawn shops in the area. But they only wanted less than half what the video cards are worth, which caused one store owner to get very suspicious. Suspecting the goods might be hot, he allegedly called the police and the trio was captured and arrested shortly after that.
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It’s unclear how many video cards the trio were able to sell before getting caught, though authorities in Russia did reportedly confiscate some of the crew’s video card haul.
Currently Russia, due to the ongoing and horrific war in Ukraine, is facing a long and growing list of sanctions. Many tech and video game companies have cut off business with the country, which has led to video cards in Russia becoming more expensive and valuable. It’s reported that one RTX 3070 now costs around 200,000 rubles in Russia or around $1900 USD. In the United States, that same card sells for only around $500 - $700.
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