A San Jose man faces federal felony charges  in connection with an alleged scheme to steal high-end performance bicycles from residents in the Bay Area and transport the bicycles to Mexico for resale.

A federal grand jury in San Jose indicted Victoriano Romero, charging him with conspiracy and related charges, the U. S. Attorney’s Office reported last week.

According to the indictment, filed Jan. 23, 2024, and unsealed Feb. 8, Romero, 53, from San Jose, participated in a complex international fencing operation that involved stealing bicycles from homes in San Francisco and Redwood City, Calif., during nighttime burglaries, and then transporting the stolen bicycles to Jalisco, Mexico, for resale.

Romero owns an automotive shop in San Jose where he received the stolen bicycles, took pictures of them, disassembled them, packaged them for delivery, and then had them transported to a co-conspirator in Mexico, prosecutors said in the indictment.

Prosecutors said Romero allegedly sent the pictures of the stolen bicycles to his co-conspirator who used the pictures for online advertisements to sell the bicycles. Further, the indictment alleges Romero received a share of the profits from the international bicycle fencing scheme.

The indictment contains a description of nine of the bicycles that were stolen between April 2020 and April 2021. The bicycles, ranging in value from $3,000 to $9,000, included notable manufacturers such as a Serotta Titanium bicycle, a Bulls Grinder Evo bicycle, and a Cervelo C3 Carbon bicycle.

The indictment also describes additional details about the participation of Romero’s indicted and unnamed co-conspirator in the scheme. For example, the indictment alleges the co-conspirator posted pictures of the stolen bicycles on a Facebook sales page using a virtual private network (or similar method) so that only persons in Mexico could see that the bicycles were for sale.

In addition, the indictment describes how the co-conspirator reassembled the bicycles in Mexico before selling them and maintained a ledger listing the profits from the sales of the bicycles.

Romero is to return to court in April to face charges of one count of conspiracy to transport stolen goods in foreign commerce and two counts of transportation of stolen goods in foreign commerce.

The maximum statutory penalty for the transportation charges is 10 years for each count.