One alleged member of the fraud ring was a U.S. Postal Service employee who is accused of stealing mail containing checks and other financial information, which he then passed on to his co-conspirators.

Fraudulent checks were deposited into member accounts that had been sourced from recruited account holders. The checks were allegedly altered to list the recruited members as payees.

Members of the fraud ring rapidly depleted the fraudulently deposited funds through electronic transfers, debit card purchases, and cash withdrawals. The illicit proceeds were then distributed among the fraud ring members and other co-conspirators.

According to court documents, some members of the ring knew how to exploit vulnerabilities in the credit unions’ fraud protection systems — knowledge they allegedly acquired through personal experience or online research. Federal prosecutors did not indicate whether any of the suspects were former credit union employees, nor did they specify why the institutions were targeted.

To conceal the alleged fraud, members of the ring reportedly instructed recruited account holders to claim their accounts had been compromised if contacted by the credit unions regarding the suspicious deposits.

In addition to Rogers, the other co-defendants — all from Fresno — were Nyric Hinton, 26; Zion Brewer, 39; Zorian Temple, 23; Davonntae Barfield, 30; and Harry Cooper Neal, 29.

All six defendants have been charged with conspiracy to commit bank fraud. Rogers was additionally charged with four counts of bank fraud and one count of aggravated identity theft. Hinton was charged with one count of bank fraud. Temple and Barfield were each charged with two counts of bank fraud.

All of the defendants have pleaded not guilty to all of their respective charges, court filings showed.

Peter Strozniak can be reached at [email protected].