Many happy returns: How feds say Glen Ellyn woman pulled off $900K retail fraud scheme

A Glen Ellyn woman stole an estimated $900,000 from a retail chain by making dozens of fraudulent merchandise returns, federal authorities allege in a recent court filing.

The scheme, outlined in an affidavit submitted by a Secret Service agent as part of a wire fraud charge, boggles the mind. (Especially of Susan, who buys online then forgets to return items until it is too late.)

The affidavit states Iryna Boguslavska made repeated returns to an unnamed chain (“Company A”) that sells clothing, accessories and home furnishings.

Authorities say Boguslavska would buy an item online, then visit a brick-and-mortar store to return the item — only it wasn’t really the same item. Instead, federal officials allege, she would sew the store’s merchandise tags on to similar, but less-expensive merchandise, often that the company didn’t even sell.

One example was a $637 floral-print dress, which she managed to get refunds for six times. A $459 swimsuit was returned 11 times. Returns were made at stores in Lombard, Oak Brook, Morton Grove, Berwyn and Broadview, according to the affidavit.

Boguslavska attorney Richard Fenbert declined to comment on the case Thursday.

She also is accused of falsely claiming she never received items she ordered, getting the company to either refund her the money or send gift cards.

Sometimes, Company A gave store credit, in the form of gift cards, officials say. Other times, it credited her bank or credit card accounts. The amounts would build up to the point the credit cards would send her checks, according to the affidavit.

When investigators searched her home in Glen Ellyn, they say they found $109,776 of fraudulently obtained merchandise, $53,000 in checks, $6,000 in cash, 164 gift cards worth more than $10,000 from Company A and 519 American Express gift cards, according to the affidavit. They also found $201,276 of legitimate merchandise from Company A.

The case is charged as wire fraud because of the use of credit and debit card transactions involving phone lines and computer networks.

Who’s Company A? We asked the federal prosecutor’s office, but they have not yet replied.

The charge was filed Oct. 15. Boguslavska was arrested Oct. 16, and later released on electronic monitoring. She can lose the ankle bracelet by posting a $25,000 cash bond by Nov. 3, court records indicate.

Clear the cabinet

Want to clean out your medicine cabinet and perhaps reduce crime and drug abuse, all in one fell swoop?

You can do that Saturday, as police departments across the suburbs take part in National Take Back Day.

The event gives people a chance to take expired or unwanted prescription drugs to their local police department for safe disposal.

According to the Drug Enforcement Administration, which held the first Take Back Day back in 2010, addiction often starts when someone gets their hands on prescription drugs left languishing in a home.

“Rates of prescription drug abuse in the U.S. are alarmingly high, as are the number of accidental poisonings and overdoses due to these drugs,” according to the agency. “Studies show that a majority of abused prescription drugs are obtained from family and friends, including from the home medicine cabinet.”

Flushing old pills down the toilet or throwing them in the trash pose potential safety and health hazards, the DEA says.

Last fall’s Take Back Day included 4,425 law enforcement agencies collecting 314 tons of unwanted drugs. Since 2010, 9,600 tons have been collected, the DEA reports.

Among the departments participating Saturday are Arlington Heights, Mount Prospect, Palatine, Naperville, Des Plaines and the Lake County Sheriff’s Office. For more information on when and where a department near you will be participating, visit www.dea.gov/takebackday.

Shop owner sued

A suburban ice cream shop owner accused of secretly recording teenage employees undressing is facing another round of litigation from his former workers.

Eleven female ex-employees between 14 and 17 years old sued Steven M. Weisberg in DuPage County court Wednesday on counts including sexual harassment, battery, intrusion upon seclusion and intentional infliction of emotional distress.

The claims stem from Weisberg’s operation of his Flavor Frenzy shop in Addison, where authorities allege he used a camera hidden in a bathroom to record unclothed female workers.

“There is little that is more wholesome than a high school job scooping ice cream at a local shop, but for our 11 teenage clients, this deceptively pleasant part-time job turned into manipulation, exploitation, shame, distrust, disrespect, and disbelief,” plaintiffs’ attorney Antonio M. Romanucci said in an announcement of the litigation Thursday.

Weisberg, 58, of Buffalo Grove, is in custody at the DuPage County jail awaiting trial on charges of child pornography and unauthorized video recording. He has pleaded not guilty and appeared in court Thursday, when a judge continued the case to Nov. 19.

Besides the secret video recording, the plaintiffs’ attorneys allege Weisberg touched workers’ hair, rubbed their backs, made inappropriate contact with their buttocks and asked them to take an online “purity test” and share the results with him.

He insisted that employees either not wear a bra or wear a strapless bra provided by him; directed them to change shirts in the restroom while secretly videotaping them; offered alcohol and marijuana gummies to underage employees; and cultivated personal relationships with minor female employees, the plaintiffs claim.

The behavior went on from 2021 to 2025, according to the plaintiffs.

The litigation comes about six weeks after another former employee sued Weisberg in Cook County court.

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