{"id":556585,"date":"2026-01-24T00:09:21","date_gmt":"2026-01-24T00:09:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/556585\/"},"modified":"2026-01-24T00:09:21","modified_gmt":"2026-01-24T00:09:21","slug":"ex-heat-security-officer-gets-prison-time-for-selling-stolen-memorabilia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/556585\/","title":{"rendered":"Ex-Heat security officer gets prison time for selling stolen memorabilia"},"content":{"rendered":"

This fire was coming from inside the house.<\/p>\n

Marcos Thomas Perez, a former security officer for the Heat, was sentenced to three years in federal prison and is ordered to pay $1.9 million in restitution after stealing hundreds of pieces of memorabilia<\/a> from the franchise while working there.<\/p>\n

According to court records, Perez, 62, was sentenced earlier this month after pleading guilty last August to transporting and transferring stolen goods in interstate commerce, the Associated Press reported Friday.<\/p>\n

\"DwyaneFormer Miami Heat player Dwyane Wade\u2019s statue stands outside of the Kaseya Center, where the NBA Miami Heat team plays on October 23, 2025, in Miami, Florida. Getty Images<\/p>\n

Perez was previously a 25-year veteran of the Miami Police Department before working for the Heat from 2016-21 and later as an NBA security employee from 2022-25.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis defendant was a former police officer who betrayed the public trust and exploited his access to our beloved hometown team for personal gain,\u201d U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida Jason Reding Qui\u00f1ones said in a statement, per AP. \u201cThe Miami Heat represent excellence built through hard work and discipline in South Florida \u2014 and this conduct was the opposite.\u201d<\/p>\n

The FBI and federal prosecutors say that Perez stole over 400 jerseys from a secured equipment room and sold off items through numerous online marketplaces.<\/p>\n

He was part of a select group of employees who had access to the secured room \u2014 that featured memorabilia that the Heat planned to use in a future team museum \u2014 because of his job working on the game-day security detail at the Kaseya Center.<\/p>\n

\"LeBronLeBron James game-worn jersey from the athletes NBA finals game 7 victory over the Miami Heat in 2013, is on display during a press preview at Sotheby\u2019s auction House on January 20, 2023, in New York City. AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n

Authorities say the items Perez stole amounted to roughly $1.9 million in value. One of the pieces was a LeBron James jersey that he wore in the NBA Finals, which he sold for about $100,000. That same jersey was later sold for $3.7 million at a Sotheby\u2019s auction.<\/p>\n

According to NBC 6 South Florida<\/a>, any items that were in Perez\u2019s possession were confiscated by the FBI, and people who had obtained items that the ex-cop stole were being asked to return them.<\/p>\n

The case initially caught public attention after NBA insider and former team executive Amin Elhassan revealed the details of the case during an appearance on an episode of \u201cThe Dan Le Batard Show\u201d last summer.<\/p>\n

Elhassan said that<\/a> the case was \u201cone of the largest, if not the largest, memorabilia heists in the history of this country in any sport.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was sold for many, many millions of dollars,\u201d Elhassan said then. \u201cAuthenticated NBA Finals collectibles belonging to the Heat were stolen and sold over at least an 18-month span \u2014 both on the open market and the black market.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This fire was coming from inside the house. Marcos Thomas Perez, a former security officer for the Heat,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":556586,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3778],"tags":[7,14497,144,13935,185,295,189,3881,6,28037,66],"class_list":["post-556585","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-miami-heat","tag-basketball","tag-courts","tag-heat","tag-investigations","tag-lebron-james","tag-miami","tag-miami-heat","tag-miamiheat","tag-nba","tag-sentencing","tag-sports"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115947174417414080","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556585","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=556585"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556585\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/556586"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=556585"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=556585"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=556585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}