Texas man gets over 7 years in prison in fake temporary car tag scheme

A Texas man was sentenced to 93 months in federal prison Wednesday for his role in a scheme to fraudulently obtain and sell hundreds of thousands of Texas-issued paper license plates.
Daniel Rocky Christine-Tani, 35, pleaded guilty last year to a conspiracy charge after prosecutors said he worked with several others to register fake used car dealerships and request temporary buyer tags from the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles. The group then sold the tags online without actually selling cars, with the tags many times ending up in the hands of people who used them to conceal their identities while committing violent crimes, officials said.
Court documents do not indicate how many tags the group sold, but said the group obtained over 700,000 temporary tags from the state of Texas over several years.
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Douglas Williams, FBI Houston special agent in charge, said in the release that Christine-Tani and his partners allowed criminals to commit crimes without fearing consequences.
“This paper tag scheme enabled criminals to use fake Texas buyer tags while perpetrating violent crimes like drive-by shootings and armed robberies,” Williams said. “FBI Houston agents proudly worked alongside law enforcement partners across the nation to dismantle this conspiracy which endangered so many American lives.”
In addition to his 93 month sentence, Christine-Tani must serve three years of supervised release after his sentence ends, and he must pay $3.4 million in restitution to the TxDMV, a DOJ news release said.
Christian Capitaine, Christine-Tani’s attorney, declined to comment on his client’s case.
The case was tried in federal court in Houston. According to the release, Christine-Tani resides in Dallas but formerly resided in Houston. Another defendant in the case, Leidy Areli Hernandez Lopez, lived in Houston, while a third defendant, Octavian Ocasio, resided in New York.
Hernandez Lopez was sentenced earlier this year to 30 months in prison followed by two years of supervised release and $316,000 paid in restitution after pleading guilty last year. Ocasio was given a 53-month sentence, three years of supervised release and $324,000 in restitution after pleading guilty last year.
The release said a fourth conspirator, Emmanuel Padilla Reyes, remains a fugitive. Officials said he also goes by the aliases Christian Hernandez Bonilla or Noel Rivera. The FBI is offering a $5,000 reward for information that leads to his arrest, and information can be submitted by calling 1-800-call-FBI or by emailing from the website TIPS.FBI.GOV