counterfeiters

NYPD: Chelsea Apartment Filled With Fake iPhones

This picture taken on November 13, 2009 shows a man (L) looking at fake iPhones displayed in a shop at a market known for counterfeit US goods and housed in the metro station connected to the Science and Technology Museum in Shanghai. Barack Obama on November 16, 2009 became the third US president to make his mark at the Shanghai Science and Technology Museum when he staged a town hall-style meeting there with hundreds of Chinese students. AFP PHOTO / PHILIPPE LOPEZ (Photo credit should read PHILIPPE LOPEZ/AFP/Getty Images)
Six different takes on the fake iPhone. Photo: PHILIPPE LOPEZ/2009 AFP

While Chinese counterfeiters have moved on from re-creating gadgets to setting up whole fake Apple stores, at least a few New Yorkers have not yet forsaken the subtle art of selling cheap knockoffs on Hell’s Kitchen street corners. Of course, not all of them are actually good at the subtle part, which is how police traced a hand-off gone wrong to a large counterfeit ring run out of a Chelsea apartment, just three blocks from Madison Square Garden. In all, they nabbed about $1 million worth of merchandise, including 500 fake iPhones and iPods, several iPads, and a few non-Apple-masquerading doodads, including over 4,000 pairs of those Beats by Dr. Dre headphones, which grow like moss from most subway riders’ heads.

NYPD: Chelsea Apartment Filled With Fake iPhones