SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. – A man is facing multiple felony charges after he allegedly posed as an Uber driver and then stole hundreds of thousands of dollars in cryptocurrency from customers in Scottsdale.

It was outside The W Scottsdale near Camelback and Scottsdale streets According to police, Nuruhussein Hussein picked up two victims there – one in March and one in October.

According to authorities, he pretended to be an Uber driver with the hidden motive of stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars in cryptocurrencies.

According to prosecutors, in both cases the alleged plan began with Hussein verbally calling out the names of alleged Uber passengers he saw waiting for their rides. Court documents did not indicate how Hussein knew the names of the victims waiting for Uber rides.

Once the victims were in the car, he had two different ways to get to the victims’ phones, according to court documents. He either initially said his phone was broken or broken, or he offered to help troubleshoot the Uber app when he was told that one of the victim’s drivers had not arrived.

Once the phone was in his hands, he was able to transfer a total of $223,000 in cryptocurrency from them, according to court documents Coinbase accounts either by phone-to-phone transmission or from phone to cold storage.

The March victim told police that Hussein gave a worrying response when she asked for his phone back.

“He threatened one of the victims that they needed to calm down or something bad would happen, and the victim believed he had a gun, even though he did not see a gun at the time,” court records state.

Because of the alleged threats and the expertise demonstrated in the fraud, prosecutors pushed for a cash-only bond of $200,000.

“If Mr Hussein is able to post bail, we would request electronic monitoring and I would also ask not to use the internet. Given that this was an extremely sophisticated electronic fraud, we do not want Mr. Hussein to potentially destroy further evidence if it exists,” a prosecutor said.

The state also argued that Hussein was a flight risk due to frequent travel to Ethiopia.

“You are not allowed to leave Maricopa County. That is part of my order today,” the judge said. “I understand that the state says you go back and forth. You have to stay here.”

The judge set Hussein on $200,000 bail and if he breaks bail he will be placed on electronic monitoring. His next court appearance is scheduled for later in December.

FOX 10 reached out to Uber and said a spokesperson was not available to comment, but offered Security resources.

What do Scottsdale police say?

According to police, officers arrested Hussein on December 11. He was taken to prison on suspicion of serious crimes including theft, fraud and money laundering.

“Scottsdale Police Department detectives and special agents from the U.S. Secret Service’s Phoenix Field Office arrested a suspect and served search warrants in a cryptocurrency fraud scheme. In this case, between March 2024 and December 2024, the suspect pretended to be an Uber driver and picked up victims who were waiting for an Uber at a hotel in Scottsdale,” the department told FOX 10 on Dec. 12.

According to the agency, the thefts totaled more than $300,000, but court documents say they totaled about $223,000.

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