Two con artists tried to bamboozle an elderly woman out of $3,000 by luring her from an Upper East Side Starbucks to an ATM, law-enforcement sources said yesterday.
Convicted felon Charles Merritt, 59, and his sidekick Thabbit Iddin, 18, strolled up to their 86-year-old target at the coffee shop on Third Avenue near East 66th Street around 1 p.m. on Wednesday, sources said.
Using a ruse called the pigeon drop, Merritt allegedly presented the woman with a wallet filled with a wad of fake bills and asked if she’d dropped it.
Iddin then asked the woman if Merritt was bothering her and offered help, sources said.
Then the two con men confused the victim into thinking she should withdraw $3,000 from her bank account that they would exchange for a larger sum of money, sources said.
Plainclothes cops in the 19th Precinct noticed the duo’s suspicious behavior and followed them up the street to an ATM machine, where police cuffed Merritt and Iddin, charging them with attempted grand larceny, sources added.
Both suspects have long rap sheets with multiple prior arrests for theft, sources said.