The Justice Department announced Tuesday that a New Jersey man was arrested for an alleged $45 million scheme to defraud and price gouge New York City into paying him for personal protective equipment that he did not possess and was not authorized to sell amid the coronavirus crisis.

The U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Geoffrey Berman and the commissioner of the New York City Department of Investigation, Margaret Garnett, announced the arrest of Ronald Romano Tuesday in connection with an attempt to exploit NYC as it tried to manage the impact of the novel coronavirus.

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Romano was charged in a criminal complaint, with one count of conspiring to commit wire fraud, one count of wire fraud, and one count of conspiring to violate the Defense Production Act.

According to the complaint, which was unsealed Tuesday, in February, Romano began attempting to obtain for resale large quantities of personal protective equipment, including N95 respirators. Romano allegedly created a fictitious authorization letter in March which, according to the complaint, “falsely represented that Romano’s company was authorized to sell millions of units of 3M-brand PPE.”

According to the complaint, Romano attempted to sell PPE for far above the prices at which he hoped to acquire the PPE, including after such PPE was designated as scarce materials under the Defense Production Act on March 25, 2020. Romano allegedly offered PPE at prices marked up by more than 500 percent of the manufacturer’s prices, and offered New York City millions of N95 respirators at more than a 400 percent markup from the list price for similar respirators.

“As alleged, used car salesman Ronald Romano saw the current health emergency as an opportunity to cash in, using lies and deception in what he envisioned as a get-rich-quick scheme,” Berman said in a statement Tuesday. “Romano allegedly lied repeatedly about his authority and ability to sell large quantities of personal protective equipment to the city – equipment he knew was desperately needed for use by frontline medical workers and first responders. And he allegedly offered to sell this phantom equipment to the city at grossly inflated prices.”

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Berman added: “Now Ronald Romano’s short-lived second career as a purveyor of vital protective gear is over.”

Garnett noted that Romano “greedily preyed on the city’s desperate need for protective equipment to stop the spread of the virus.”

“Instead of reaping millions of dollars, the scheme received a dose of old-fashioned, New York City skepticism from procurement specialists at the city’s Department of Citywide Administrative Services, when the city called the supposed manufacturer to confirm the astronomical asking price,” Garnett explained.

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Romano is expected in federal court Tuesday afternoon. The charges each carry a maximum sentence of 30 years in prison, and the one count of conspiring to violate the Defense Production Act, carries a maximum sentence of not more than one year in prison.

The arrest comes after Attorney General Bill Barr vowed early in the pandemic to go after price gougers and those who hoard crucial medical supplies amid the battle against COVID-19.

Also in March, President Trump signed an executive order that would prohibit the accumulation of supplies such as hand sanitizer, face masks and personal protective equipment in order to profit off the virus.

The order gave Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Alex Azar the authority to designate certain supplies as scarce or as supplies threatened by people accumulating excessive amounts. Those found to be hoarding supplies or price gouging could face criminal prosecution.