George Santos was interviewed by police in 2017 international credit card fraud probe

In the early evening on April 17, 2017, a Chase Bank security officer in Seattle watched through an ATM's camera as a man approached and removed a card-skimming device.

Moments later, police officers pounced, arresting the man, Gustavo Ribeiro Trelha, then an Orlando, Florida, resident. The case would lead to a guilty plea and Trelha's deportation back to his native Brazil. It also led an investigator — for reasons still not entirely clear — to George Santos, the future New York congressman.