Complaint Review: Zuleyma Garcia - Compton California

On Friday August 22,2014 I looked for a Galaxy S5 phone to purchase since my current phone was having issues. I text many people on craigslist and some replied while some didn't. This seller (Zuleyma Garcia) replied and she told me that she still had the phone. She posted the phone for $350 used but that she only had the phone for a few days. The reason that she was selling the phone was that she purchased the phone for her grandma but that it was too much technology for her, so she wanted to sell the phone to get some money back. She's located in Compton,CA  so I told her to hold the phone and that I would go there after traffic died down a bit because it was 6pm traffic, so it would take me forever to get there. She told me that it's ok she would do that for me. She told me to meet her at Wilmington and rosacrans that there is a gas station that's public to meet up at there.  I met up with her at 8:55pm that day to look at the phone. She handed me a galaxy S5 box it looked new and undamaged. I took out the white phone and it looked like a galaxy S5 very clean as well. I turned it on and it said Samsung and loaded up. I called T-mobile to see if the IMEI number was black listed and T-mobile told me that it's not blacklisted. I played with the phone and it seemed fine but it seemed off a bit. It was missing the white water square indicator and I asked her about it but she said that she didn't know about it. I put my T-mobile sim card in the phone to try it out. I made a quick phone call and it made the call but the voice was very faint. I thought it was just because we were close. She was in a hurry to leave and the phone looked clean so I went to my car grabbed the money and I purchased it. After she left I noticed that the phone said BAD IMEI after I pulled down the menu and the internet didn't work. I called her but she didn't answer this time. I called her back to back but she avoided my calls. I text her as well but she didn't reply. I went to another gas station because the one that I was at started to get busy. I called her 5 more times and text her once again but nothing. I asked a girl who pulled up to put gas if I could borrow her phone to make a call because I just got scammed, she said yes. I stayed next to her so she knew that I wasn't going to take her phone. I called Zuleyma 5 times but she didn't pick up. I text her as well through the girls phone but she text back that she was driving. The girl that helped me told me to file a police report at the police station which is really close. I stopped by at the police station and I told the police what happened. They told me that there was nothing that they could do. I told the police that I just got scammed and that I want them to call this girl to the station so that I can get my money back in which the officer replied "I'm sorry but I can't do that. "

On Saturday

I went to many phone retailers to find out what carrier the phone was for. I went to Verizon wireless, AT&T, T-mobile, Sprint, and Metro PCS. I found out that the phone worked for AT&T but it works on the 3G internet not 4G LTE. It also works for T-mobile but the internet doesn't work at all. What all the stores told me in common was that the phone seemed off that it was a clone even though it looked close to a Galaxy S5 that it wasn't a Galaxy it was a clone. When compared side by side the real copy was heavier, smoother on page movement, the real one had as an HD display while the clone didn't and the fingerprint reader didn't work on clone while it did on the real copy.

On Sunday

I didn't have much on the girl who sold me the phone but her phone number which it wasn't enough to file a claim or track her down so it wasn't until today that I asked friends for help on what to do and one told me to look on facebook. I gave it a shot and found her on facebook. This is her profile link

(((REDACTED)))

That's how I found out her name and last name as well as got pictures of what she looked like for proof.

On Tuesday night I tried to give her a chance to fix things so I text her:

Zuleyma,

The phone that you sold me on Friday August 22, 2014 at 9:00pm is a  counterfeit Galaxy S5. I want my money back. I have been trying to call & text you but haven’t had any luck reaching you. I’m in the process of filing a police report and taking you to court. Call or text me to resolve this issue without further action.
Thank you

-She didn't reply to it but she did delete her facebook account...smart girl. She's trying to run.