Two men were bailed in Magistrates’ Court this morning after they were formally charged with offences relating to debit card fraud.

Yan Infante-Almanzar, 20, of Pembroke, was charged with 20 counts of dishonestly obtaining goods from various merchants, 20 counts of using false instruments namely debit cards, two counts of dishonestly receiving goods, one count of dishonestly attempting to obtain property, one count of possessing a machine with a magnetic stripe card reader, one count of using the machine to make a false debit card and one count of making the false card.

Dariel Reyes-Nunez, 18, of Hamilton Parish, was charged with five counts of dishonestly obtaining goods, five counts of using a false instrument, and one count of making a false debit card.

All the offences are alleged to have occurred on various unknown dates between January 26 and February 5 this year.

The court heard that the two Dominican nationals worked at the same place, where they allegedly used a scanner to duplicate the card details onto their own bank cards.

Prosecutor Susan Mulligan said that the value of the goods and services they allegedly purchased totalled about $2,000 and was mainly spent on electronics and in restaurants.

She added that the two defendants were in Bermuda with their mothers, who are married to Bermudians.

Ms Mulligan said: “They clearly had fairly sophisticated equipment.”

She added that the investigation included evidence provided from within the United States and that someone in the Dominican Republic tried twice to use the stolen information.

Magistrate Khamisi Tokunbo set bail for both men at $15,000 with a like surety and ordered that they wear electronic monitoring devices.

He also ordered that both men reside at the addresses they provided to the court, have a nightly curfew of 8pm, not leave the jurisdiction without permission of the court, surrender all travel documents and report to Police on Mondays and Fridays between 6am and 7pm.

The two men were not required to enter a plea today, but a mention date was set for March 16.

• Also in court this morning, a St George’s man was remanded into custody after he denied violating a domestic violence protection order.

Damany Burchall, 33, also pleaded not guilty to unlawfully and wilfully damaging a window.

The offences are alleged to have occurred in Pembroke on February 20.

Magistrate Khamisi Tokunbo remanded Mr Burchall into custody and set a trial date for April 28.