Two More Sentenced in Philadelphia Cargo-Theft Crew That Stole $230,000 in Dimes

Two Philadelphia men were sentenced to federal prison this month over a crew that broke into tractor-trailers across the city in 2023. Prosecutors say the group stole more than $1.5 million in freight from more than 10 victims, including over $230,000 in newly minted U.S. dimes.

Haneef Palmer, 33, was sentenced to 121 months on September 9, and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania announced it the next day. Chief U.S. District Judge Wendy Beetlestone sentenced Rakiem Savage, 28, to 108 months on September 15. Both men also received three years of supervised release.

Palmer’s longest term is on a robbery count, and he was ordered to pay $1,080,786.44 in restitution, the government’s total for all of the crew’s thefts. Savage was ordered to pay $234,474.80, the value of the stolen dimes.

The two are among ten defendants in United States v. Savage. A third, Salahudin Reddy, 39, was sentenced in June to 94 months, and an amended judgment on September 1 set his restitution at $893,574.77. Savage pleaded guilty to all ten counts in October 2025, Reddy to eight counts in March and Palmer to all ten later that month.

The other seven defendants have pleaded not guilty. Jury selection in their trial is set for November 6. Palmer and Reddy are both appealing. Palmer filed notice on September 14, and the Third Circuit has stayed his appeal pending a judgment order from the district court. Reddy has filed twice, in June and again this month.

According to court filings, the crew hunted for tractor-trailers parked around Philadelphia, targeting ones left unattended overnight or whose drivers were asleep. The superseding indictment says members called others in when they found a target, cut in with bolt cutters, often posted lookouts and split the proceeds. They moved goods in vehicles including a box truck and sold them to local buyers.

Court filings list thefts on 16 dates between January 27 and July 20, 2023. The loads included 36 LG televisions, 60 cases of tequila, 10,000 pounds of frozen turkey wings and 2.5 pallets of Tito’s vodka. The superseding indictment quotes a March 31 text from Palmer to the group: “From Tvs Appliances Liquor & Meat … We Split Everything.”

The heaviest stretch came in April 2023, when prosecutors say the crew took more than $1 million in goods in about two weeks. On April 1, Palmer and Savage joined in robbing a trailer hauling commercial refrigerators. Prosecutors say the driver woke to find the crew unloading his truck and was chased, grabbed, forced underneath a box truck and injured.

Over the next nine days, the crew hit two trailers loaded with snow crab, each carrying more than 30,000 pounds by the government’s count, and one hauling 103 Samsung televisions.

The dime shipment was headed from the U.S. Mint in Philadelphia to the Federal Reserve Bank in Miami. A 2024 court opinion, citing a detective’s affidavit, says the trailer sat overnight in a Walmart lot when it was hit early on April 13. Surveillance video showed 10 or more people in dark clothing arriving in two vehicles, and investigators found bolt cutters at the scene. Prosecutors estimated the load at more than 11,700 pounds of coins.

Police obtained a warrant for data from cell towers serving the area. It showed a call between Savage’s and Palmer’s phones while the heist was underway, and Judge Beetlestone refused to throw out that evidence in July 2024.

Prosecutors also cited a months-long group text chat the crew used to coordinate thefts and congratulate one another. The day after the dime heist, Savage sent the group a screenshot of a social media post about it and wrote, “We made it!” The indictments allege members later cashed dimes at Coinstar machines in Maryland and Pennsylvania credit union branches.

Savage’s sentence also covers a separate racketeering case involving Omerta, a group based in Philadelphia’s Strawberry Mansion neighborhood. He admitted taking part in its counterfeiting and pandemic unemployment fraud and was ordered to repay $37,425 in that case. His lawyer had asked for 72 months, arguing the cargo losses were financial and largely recoverable through restitution.

Nationally, thefts of unattended trailers are declining, according to Verisk CargoNet. Its second-quarter 2026 analysis counted 677 theft incidents in the U.S. and Canada, down 26% from a year earlier, even as estimated losses more than doubled to $304.6 million.

The Philadelphia case shows how long a crew can run when loaded trailers sit unguarded: thefts on at least 16 dates over roughly six months. For shippers and carriers, it argues for tighter rules on where high-value loads park overnight and how they are locked and watched. The April 1 robbery adds a harder lesson: a sleeping driver is not a safeguard, and can become a victim.