MIAMI SPRINGS, Fla. – A 55-year-old man is facing a felony charge in South Florida for a bizarre impersonation scheme that left pizza customers getting a raw deal, authorities said.
Police said he ran “an elaborate scheme to defraud tourists staying in the hotels of Miami Springs” by pretending to be a well-known local pizza parlor.
According to police, customers who thought they were ordering pies from Roman’s Pizzeria, located at 391 N. Royal Poinciana Blvd., were instead getting subpar slices from Jose Marti-Alvarez.
Marti-Alvarez “distributed fake pizza flyers to hotel rooms” along Northwest 36th Street, near Miami International Airport, advertising “Roman Pizzeria,” misleading visitors, according to Miami Springs police.
Jesus Roman, the proprietor of the real Roman’s Pizzeria, who’s been cooking up pies for four decades, said Marti-Alvarez’s pizzas were “bad, uncooked, sometimes they (were sent) in a box with a piece of raw dough.”
“They just give it to them and by (the) time they realize it they’re gone anyway,” Roman said.
Police said the fraud had been “ongoing for several years” and has caused “significant hardships” for the real Roman’s, “including complaints to the Better Business Bureau, negative reviews and upset customers.“
“So sometimes they show up upset here to the store claiming ‘Where’s the food?” Roman said. “We have to explain to them that it’s not us.”
After Roman went to police, officers arrested Marti-Alvarez on a charge of organized scheme to defraud and booked him into jail early Monday morning.
“At least if you’re going to do something, do it right,” Roman said.
Marti-Alvarez, of Miami Gardens, is also facing an aggravated battery charge “after fleeing from hotel staff in his vehicle and hitting a staff member” with the vehicle, police said.
In court Monday afternoon, Miami-Dade Judge Mindy Glazer ordered Marti-Alvarez to stay away from the Days Inn at 4767 NW 36th St., where the victim works.
In open court, a lawyer, seeking to have the aggravated battery charge dismissed, read from an arrest report that states that he told officers that he “left the area fast and didn’t think he had hit her with the car because he understood he wasn’t supposed to be passing out the pizza flyers at the hotel.”
Nevertheless, Glazer found probable cause to charge Marti-Alvarez with aggravated battery, giving him a $5,000 bond.
His bond for the organized scheme to defraud charge was listed in jail records as “to be set.”
Marti-Alvarez was being held at the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center as of Monday evening, online records show.