Electrician steals 1,600 N95 masks slated to be donated to New Jersey hospital, AG says

A New Jersey man is accused of stealing 1,600 N95 masks that were intended to be donated to a local hospital to fight the coronavirus pandemic, according to the state’s Attorney General’s Office and Middlesex County Prosecutor’s Office.

Authorities were alerted to 49-year-old Kevin Brady following a referral from the National Hoarding & Price Gouging Task Force, the Attorney General’s Office said Thursday.

Brady was employed as an electrician between March 27 and April 1 at a Prudential Financial building, where the theft allegedly occurred, according to the prosecutor’s office. He had unrestricted access to a caged storage area in the basement of the facility and stole seven or eight cases of N95 respirator masks, according to the prosecutor.

Each case contained 200 masks, and Prudential intended for them to be donated to a local hospital, the attorney general said.

The insurance company stockpiled masks following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and last month donated 153,000 of them to New Jersey hospitals, according to NJ.com.

Brady was charged with third-degree theft and third-degree conspiracy to commit theft, according to the prosecutor’s office.

Coronavirus fraud and price gouging can be reported to the National Center for Disaster Fraud’s national hotline at disaster@leo.gov.

This story was originally published April 17, 2020 at 12:37 PM with the headline "Electrician steals 1,600 N95 masks slated to be donated to New Jersey hospital, AG says."