Officials said Ningning Sun was found with more than 5,000 gift cards in his car.
SACRAMENTO, Calif — A thief caught with thousands of Target gift cards from throughout the state will be behind bars for a year before moving to probation, the Sacramento County District Attorney’s Office announced.
Ningning Sun pleaded no contest to felony charges related to organized retail theft, attempted grand theft, receipt of stolen property and unlawful possession of an old access card. He also pleaded to a misdemeanor count of resisting a police officer.
Sun was arrested during a Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office operation in December 2023. Officials said he was seen in a Target store re-shelving gift cards while taking new ones and hiding them on his person.
He left the store and tried to take off. About 200 stolen gift cards fell out of his clothes when he was caught by deputies, according to the district attorney’s office, and more than 5,000 gift cards from Target locations across the state were found in his car. They included cards both tampered and not tampered with.
Officials said Sun was also linked to stolen access cards from various Target locations and that he was a runner and organizer for a larger organized crime network. He allegedly drove to Target stores in California, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Tennessee and Illinois, and had pay/owe sheets with more than 140 names, numbers, payment periods and time limits for pay back.
The intended loss from the tampered gift cards ranged between $31,125 to $2.8 million, depending on how much was put on the cards, according to the district attorney’s office.
Sun will serve one year of his sentence in the Sacramento County jail and the remaining two years and eight months on probation. He was also ordered to stay away from all Target locations and pay restitution.
