It's a familiar experience for anyone who has walked through an American shopping mall: A friendly salesperson approaches with a free sample of skincare cream, offering the promise of younger-looking skin. As you pass, they launch into a stream of chatter — a compliment on your handbag or a question about what's in your shopping bag. It's the kind of encounter that shoppers often walk away from without a second thought.
But behind this familiar mall ritual, NPR uncovered something far more costly: customers hit with thousands of dollars in charges they never authorized and products they didn't want and can't return.
In Michigan, an elderly man with dementia was charged $42,000 for skincare products and devices. His family didn't realize the situation until his credit score dropped, his son told NPR.
In New Mexico, a spa employee sold a woman a $30,000 red-light therapy device. She alleged in a lawsuit that he also charged $78,000 for what he said was sales tax without her consent.
In Hawaii, a disabled woman was shown to the back room of a spa for a "free" facial. The salesperson took her walker, she wrote in a complaint to the state, and refused to let her leave for hours until she spent $2,600.
These stories share a common thread: The stores they visited have contracts to buy skincare products from Mazal Group, a California-based company managing dozens of brands sold in thousands of stores worldwide. And those brands are all owned by one family.
Over the past year, NPR spoke with more than 50 people impacted by this enterprise, including customers who say they were taken advantage of, their family members and former employees. This investigation draws from state and federal court lawsuits, hundreds of online reviews and nearly 500 consumer complaints that NPR obtained from agencies via Freedom of Information Act requests. NPR staff visited stores selling products from Mazal Group in Virginia, Maryland and California, as well as the company's Chatsworth, Calif., headquarters.
NPR's investigation finds that stores selling skincare products purchased from Mazal Group have routinely pressured shoppers, including older adults and people with disabilities, into buying expensive skincare products and services they did not want, could not afford or tried to refuse. The business model that a decade ago federal agents called a "credit card overcharge scheme" is active today in malls and shopping districts from Honolulu to Annapolis, Maryland.
Some store and kiosk operators have faced more serious legal consequences than consumer complaints. Federal agencies have investigated individual operators for employing young Israelis on tourist visas to sell these products, resulting in more than a dozen guilty pleas for visa fraud and money-laundering schemes. NPR reviewed social media posts and messages indicating that some stores connected to Mazal Group continue to employ salespeople on tourist visas today. The government hasn't brought similar charges for a decade, and Israel's admission to the U.S. Visa Waiver Program in 2023 has removed a key barrier to entry for unauthorized workers.
Though Mazal Group and the family behind it have publicly shifted responsibility for any wrongdoing onto individual store owners, NPR obtained documents that show their brands suggest stores sell products at abnormally high markups while adhering to a strict refund policy set by the group. And a lab test commissioned by NPR raises questions about whether some of the products they sell contain the ingredients their labels promise.
The playbook
Across the hundreds of complaints reviewed by NPR — filed with state attorneys general, the Federal Trade Commission, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the Better Business Bureau and other watchdogs — customers describe their experiences in strikingly similar ways.
Their stories start with a young salesperson standing outside a store or mall kiosk offering free samples. Customers say that if they stop, the salesperson quickly escorts — and in some accounts, physically pulls — them into the store and begins a barrage of sales pitches.
In the complaints, customers describe being kept in stores for an hour or more, sometimes isolated in a back room, while salespeople refuse to take no for an answer. The products carry no price tags, they say, which frees the salesperson to negotiate "special sales" and throw in "free gifts" to sweeten the deal on an expensive cream, facial or red-light therapy device.
Shoppers reported to agencies that salespeople did not disclose the amount they charged at the register, which was often much higher than the agreed-upon price. One told authorities that the salesperson added a zero, increasing the sum tenfold from $1,300 to $13,000. In police reports, others allege a store employee told them their card declined when it had not and charged a second card as well.
In court cases, shoppers alleged the salesperson instructed them to sign on a tablet at checkout, not mentioning it was a final-sale policy that could be used against them in credit card disputes. Some said they were signed up for a "payment plan" that salespeople didn't disclose was really a high-interest loan. In some reports, customers said the salesperson instructed them to authorize charges flagged by their bank as potentially fraudulent.
At the bottom of the bag, many said, the salesperson buried a receipt that said, "All sales final. No refunds. No exchanges."
In official reports and NPR interviews, customers said they were left angry, stunned and ashamed at how much they were charged, from several hundred dollars to more than $100,000 in one case. Records show some customers recovered partial or full amounts through their credit card companies, while others remained on the hook for thousands. Police reports show numerous shoppers tried to escalate their complaint to authorities, but arrests were almost never made.
In written reports, customers compared the ordeal to being robbed, held hostage or physically assaulted. NPR spoke to five individuals who hid the experience from their families for months or years. One woman said she went into a period of deep depression: "I just felt like if this is the way people are, I don't want to live in a world like this."
"We usually don't see a business that is this brazen"
In New Mexico, Attorney General Raúl Torrez's office received dozens of complaints about a store called Santa Fe Spa Center by Voupre that, he said, "painted a picture that this was a business that was just brazenly taking advantage of people."
One woman said a salesperson kept her in the store for hours until she agreed to spend $600 on products from the skincare brand Voupre. The salesperson said her credit card was declined, so she provided another. Later that day, she was "mortified" to see two charges totaling $44,280 in her banking app.
"I thought, 'How did they do that?' I really didn't know what had happened," said the 67-year-old woman, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of reprisal from the spa owner.
When the store would not refund her, she successfully disputed a charge for $27,000 with one credit card company. But she was responsible for $17,280 for a shopping experience she called "traumatic."
Torrez filed a lawsuit against the store in 2024, alleging violations of New Mexico's Unfair Practices Act.
"The scale of the price increases, the aggressive tactics, the repeated practice of misquoting prices and then elevating prices while refusing to return a product — we usually don't see a business that is this brazen and this out in the open, in terms of what they're trying to do to take advantage of consumers," said Torrez.
The spa's owner is Sahar Hori, an Israeli national who, according to court records, is also a U.S. citizen. Hori closed the spa and settled his case with New Mexico in 2025, agreeing to pay $350,000 in restitution to customers.
One of those customers is Mary Lee, an artist from Duluth, Minnesota. She said Hori's employees pressured her into spending nearly $19,000 on products while she was visiting Santa Fe for a writer's retreat. She said she tried to get her money back before returning home, but the refund she said a salesman promised her never came through.
The debt weighed on her like "a lead vest, an anchor," she told NPR. Lee is 65 and retired from full-time work. This year, through New Mexico's settlement, she was made whole.
"I feel a ton has been lifted off my shoulders," she said. "I don't feel like Atlas carrying the world anymore."
A small group of customers brought a second case against Hori, which settled in February 2026 for an undisclosed amount. While his customers were complaining to the New Mexico Department of Justice, financial records obtained in that lawsuit show the store's bank account was used to pay a lease to Mercedes-Benz and rent for a downtown Miami high-rise apartment. On his Instagram, Hori posted pictures of beach vacations in Europe and the Caribbean.
"Mr. Hori acknowledges that some customers were unhappy," his lawyers told NPR, "but he disputes any characterizations that his business intentionally deceived anyone."
A pattern around the country
The aggressive tactics documented in Santa Fe are replicated in shopping centers nationwide.
In Ann Arbor, Mich., Michele Anliker said her elderly mother was "preyed upon" at a Briarwood Mall store called Beauty Essentials during a 2024 Christmas trip, ultimately leaving with $5,000 in Voupre skincare products she did not want. When Anliker confronted the employees, she said, they accused her mother of stealing.
Anliker complained to mall management, filed a police report and distributed flyers warning shoppers away from Beauty Essentials. She posted on Facebook and connected with more than 30 people with complaints about the store. It wasn't until she escalated the situation to the mall's owner, Simon Property Group, that she secured a refund.
Cheryle Grounds' 84-year-old father was unable to recover the almost $10,000 he spent at Beauty Essentials on New Year's Day 2025. He has poor hearing and eyesight, and he walks the mall for exercise. Grounds told NPR that her father believed he bought a facial package but was also charged for Voupre items he understood to be gifts with purchase.
Grounds and Anliker declined to identify their parents by name, citing privacy concerns for their elderly parents.
In Manhattan Beach, Calif., 82-year-old retired teacher Mary Ellen Eckhert — who uses a motorized wheelchair — stopped for a free sample outside the store Mia's by Voupre. She would return to the spa for regular facials over the next year, where store employees ultimately charged her $53,500 across four credit cards, including $24,045 on one visit.
"What kind of a spa charges anyone $54,000?" said her son, Marc Eckhert, who discovered the charges after his mother's bank account overdrew. While the family managed to dispute much of the debt, Mary Ellen Eckhert remains out more than $17,000.
"I'm feeling like I have to continue working in order to pay for all this," she said.
NPR reached out to the former owner of Beauty Essentials, Guy Gabay, and did not receive a response. The store closed in 2025. The Briarwood Mall and Simon Property Group did not respond to NPR's request for comment.
NPR visited Mia's by Voupre and reached representative Daniella Vanon by phone, who declined to comment. The Manhattan Village Mall, where the store is located, did not respond to NPR.
The family behind the operation
While Santa Fe Spa Center by Voupre, Beauty Essentials and Mia's by Voupre were independently owned and located thousands of miles apart, the stores all sold customers Voupre products, a brand sold exclusively by Mazal Group in Chatsworth, California.
The company is a family business, owned by Daphna Oded Weingarten, who operates the group alongside her husband, Eli Weingarten; her brother, Avihu Oded; and his ex-wife, Adi Sharvit Oded.
Mazal translates to "luck" or "good fortune" in Hebrew. The Weingartens and Odeds are originally from Israel, as are the majority of corporate employees and licensees (store owners), according to former staff members.
Five former corporate employees agreed to speak with NPR on the condition of anonymity, fearing retaliation from Mazal Group. A small cohort of non-Israelis staffs the design, engineering and marketing departments, they said, as well as the on-site warehouse that fulfills orders.
The Weingartens and Odeds founded their first brand together in 2005 — a line of hair straighteners called HerStyler, under the company HerStyler Inc. A host of sister brands soon followed, and various other companies to house those brands. In 2015, Daphna Weingarten established Mazal Group to centralize operations for the family's growing portfolio.
The family currently holds more than 50 active trademarks for skin and hair care brands. Among the most prominent are Voupre, Avinichi, Introstem, CbGäRDN, Venofye, Lionesse and Orogold Cosmetics, which sell a nearly identical line of products.
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"The reason why they have so many brands is because they had to keep remaking brands with different names to sell it a different way to the malls so that they could get a lease," one former employee told NPR.
Another said store owners who purchased from Mazal Group distanced themselves from a brand once it started to accumulate bad reviews and complaints.
"People would complain about a line, about a brand being destroyed and having a bad reputation," the former worker said. "So they would constantly come out with something fresh, something new."
A former corporate employee said it's difficult to measure Mazal Group's precise global footprint because stores open and close frequently, but estimated the company contracts with at least 2,000 stores worldwide.
While reporting this story, NPR attempted to reach the Weingartens, Odeds and Mazal Group via phone and email, as well as visiting the Chatsworth headquarters to request an interview. They did not acknowledge this outreach until NPR sent a letter describing its findings, and lawyers for the group provided a brief statement.
"Mazal Group does not own or operate any retail locations that sell cosmetic products or any other products for that matter. Nor does Mazal Group manufacture any products," said Brian Tilker of the firm Cox Fricke in Hawaii.
Mazal Group looms large in the skincare kiosk industry, but it's not the only player in the market. Premier Dead Sea, an Israel-based skincare company, was once widespread in U.S. malls but has scaled back its footprint in recent years. Its subsidiary, Avologi, manufactures many of the red-light therapy devices that customers reported being pressured to buy inside stores contracted with Mazal Group.
Premier Dead Sea and Avologi also did not respond to NPR's requests for comment.
Operation "Salty Winds"
Federal agencies have investigated crimes associated with the Israeli-owned skincare industry in the past, but a lack of sustained and coordinated oversight has allowed it to thrive from coast to coast.
In 2010, the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv, Israel, sent a cable to the Department of Homeland Security warning of fraudulent activity linked to the "Dead Sea industry," which had spread to 36 states.
The term refers to the many Israeli-owned stores and kiosks that were marketing the benefits of products made with salt or minerals from the Dead Sea. The Odeds and Weingartens faced competition from companies like Premier Dead Sea, which was also gaining a foothold in the States with its own family of brands.
In the cable, published by WikiLeaks, the embassy said recruiters in Israel were targeting young people finishing mandatory military service and promising large sums to be made working at American malls. The workers were coached to lie to U.S. consular and border officials to obtain a tourist visa and travel to the U.S. without work authorization, the cable reads. In the States, they were paid under the table and store owners failed to withhold or pay required payroll taxes on their wages, it continues.
The embassy also released a series of public service announcements on YouTube in 2011, featuring the cautionary tales of young Israelis who had been caught by U.S. authorities for illegally working on tourist visas and were either deported or later denied reentry to the United States.
Soon after, federal agencies coordinated to investigate two businesses selling products from brands owned by the Weingartens and Odeds for immigration and financial crimes. The combined efforts of the departments of Labor, State and Homeland Security, the FBI and the IRS culminated in raids, international extraditions and more than a dozen guilty pleas.
In a 2013 operation code-named "Salty Winds," a task force of federal agents surveilled stores and apartments leased to Israeli national Shai Cohen in the D.C.-Maryland-Virginia region. Cohen had kiosks selling Vine Vera and Orogold Cosmetics, brands owned by the Weingartens and Odeds, as well as locations selling Premier Dead Sea and its affiliates.
Cohen's enterprise employed an estimated 60 unauthorized workers and brought in nearly $4 million between 2011 and 2013, according to federal records.
Cohen, two managers and at least seven salespeople engaged in fraudulent marriages to stay in the country long term, according to a Department of Labor interview of Cohen's business partner that NPR obtained via a Freedom of Information Act request. One salesman paid an American woman working at another store in the mall $10,000 to marry him.
Special Agent Matt Grimm, then an investigator for the Department of Labor's Office of Inspector General, led the task force. Grimm recently retired from the Army's Criminal Investigation Division.
While agents were pursuing immigration fraud and tax evasion charges, they also documented a "credit card overcharge scheme" used to dupe shoppers at Cohen's stores.
"There's no price tag," said Grimm, who observed sales and made purchases himself. "Whatever the salesperson on the spot thinks that they can charge for a particular thing, they're going to get. The more they sell, the higher their commission is going to be."
In a Christmastime raid, Grimm's team arrested a dozen young Israelis working at Cohen's stores on tourist visas. The store owner was in Israel at the time, triggering a yearslong extradition process.
Cohen pleaded guilty in 2023 in Virginia to conspiracy to launder money and facilitate the illegal entry, harboring and transporting of noncitizens. He served 11 months of a two-year prison sentence. NPR tried to reach Cohen through his real estate business in Israel and did not receive a response.
One of Cohen's contemporaries was another Israeli national, named Omer Gur, owner of a larger group of stores along the East Coast, including Orogold Cosmetics locations.
"Instead of looking at one kiosk or one store in one location, we wanted to cut the head off the snake," FBI Special Agent Sara Shalowitz said of Gur.
Shalowitz led a team that covertly surveilled Gur's stores for three years before apprehending him in Raleigh, N.C., as he attempted to board a one-way international flight.
Gur pleaded guilty in 2016 to a visa fraud and money-laundering conspiracy that included over 140 unauthorized workers and earned more than $14 million, according to the Justice Department. He was sentenced to 6.5 years in prison and served 30 months. A dozen of his associates pleaded guilty on related charges, Shalowitz said.
"I think we set a real deterrence for why this matters," Shalowitz told NPR. "It's not just some administrative thing to come to the U.S. under false pretenses, defraud numerous agencies … for the profit of your business and your business partners, at the expense of violating U.S. law."
NPR reached Gur, who also works in real estate in Israel, by phone. He declined to comment.
The recruitment pipeline
Cohen's and Gur's prison sentences may not have been a lasting deterrent for store owners or prospective salespeople.
On Facebook groups and Instagram pages, recruiters advertise jobs working in mall kiosks, or "agalot" — Hebrew for "carts." They promise young people the opportunity to bring in a high income and live in American cities with others their age. One account posts memes about the highs and lows of working in the agalot: long hours, difficult customers and boatloads of money to be made.
A young Israeli man posted a video to YouTube in November 2025 describing his last three months working at a store that sells Introstem, a brand owned by the Weingartens and Odeds and distributed by Mazal Group. NPR confirmed the store location in a Texas mall through photographs on his social media accounts.
"There is a lot of money in the agalot," he said. "A seller who is good after a few months, you sharpen your skills, and you become an expert. You can make $10,000 a month like it's nothing."
He described having a company vehicle and furnished apartment, with rent deducted from his pay. Workers make a 30% commission on their sales, he said.
"It's hard work, not easy," he said. "But it's a good job considering the fact that you can print money just based on your silver tongue."
NPR reached the 20-year-old to request an interview. He said he wanted payment, which NPR does not do. NPR is not using his name because it would expose him to federal officials for immigration crimes that he admits to in the video.
"It's illegal," he said. "Why is it illegal? Because you are tourists. You are on a tourist visa, and you come to work."
"But immigration authorities aren't looking for us. Immigration is looking for the Mexicans who sell drugs, less for the Israelis who contribute to their economy."
NPR staff also engaged online with recruiters for stores selling the Weingartens and Odeds' products. One, hiring for a store selling their brand Lionesse in South Carolina, told NPR staff to obtain a visa before they could share more details about the job. They "don't help with visas," the recruiter said.
Between the lines is the suggestion to work on a tourist visa, legal experts told NPR. Companies legally employing foreign staff submit mandatory paperwork to the State Department for nonimmigrant work visas.
Travel to the U.S. has also become easier for Israelis since Israel's 2023 admission to the U.S. Visa Waiver Program. Most Israelis can now visit the U.S. for up to 90 days for business or tourism, visa-free, by completing a short online application 72 hours before travel.
"That removes a key step in the recruitment process," said Grimm, who previously served as a diplomatic security special agent with the Department of State. Since most Israelis no longer need to interview with a U.S. consular official before departure, he said, "it's as simple as getting on the airplane and going. But, you're still not authorized to work."
NPR reached out to the departments of Homeland Security, Labor and State, the IRS and the FBI to comment on whether they continue to investigate Israeli-owned skincare stores for federal crimes. They would not say whether oversight or enforcement is ongoing.
NPR contacted dozens of current and former salespeople at stores selling products from Mazal Group to hear their side of the story. None agreed to be interviewed, even on the condition of anonymity. Two asked to be paid, which NPR declined.
NPR also reached out to Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs to ask whether it is taking action to discourage unauthorized work in the U.S. or address recruitment pipelines.
"The State of Israel unequivocally opposes violations of U.S. law, including U.S. immigration law," said Ester Buzgan, deputy spokesperson for the ministry. "Israeli citizens seeking employment in the United States must hold a valid work visa and comply fully with the law."
"Predatory and systematically unfair"
Because the stores it sells products to are independently owned and operated, Mazal Group claims it isn't responsible for the customer experience. But the company recently settled a class action lawsuit that made public reams of evidence showing that Mazal Group is directly involved in store operations and sets top-down policies that impact shoppers.
Attorneys for a class of former customers filed suit in 2022 in the 1st Circuit Court of Hawaii, alleging Mazal Group, the Weingartens and Odeds, and store owners in the state violated consumer protection laws via a "predatory and systematically unfair and deceptive enterprise."
Mazal Group asked the judge, unsuccessfully, to dismiss the case on the grounds that the company is merely a distributor that "drop ships" products for a "third-party" and owns no brands of its own.
The Weingarten and Oded family directly owns brands and manages the operations of those brands through Mazal Group. And the company's website advertises services beyond distribution, including product development, marketing, leasing, customer relations and accounting.
NPR confirmed with former Mazal Group employees that the company helps store owners secure retail space in malls and assists with the design and layout of individual locations. The company's marketing team designs product packaging and manages brand websites and social media accounts, they said.
"The Mazal Group owners and officers are involved in every step of the process, from product design to distribution to store design and development to sales to post-sale concerns," concluded a research firm hired by the plaintiffs' attorneys.
Mazal Group's agreements with stores also reveal a direct link between company policy and customer complaints. The company requires branded stores — e.g., locations with Voupre or Lionesse in the store name — to exclusively sell products purchased from Mazal Group, adopt a refund policy determined by the group and direct all customer service inquiries to its headquarters, court records show. These agreements also establish guidelines for how salespeople should offer samples to passersby.
After four years of pretrial action, the Hawaii class action case was scheduled for a jury trial in July 2026 in Honolulu. In June, the parties announced they had reached a settlement.
Mazal Group, the Weingartens and Odeds, and two licensees in Hawaii agreed to pay $950,000 in restitution, according to a copy of the settlement agreement obtained by NPR. Mazal Group and the family are responsible for $650,000 of the total payout. After legal fees, funds will be distributed proportionately to 110 class members who filed a complaint with the state of Hawaii.
Mazal Group and the Weingartens and Odeds have denied wrongdoing, and the settlement releases them from future liability for the allegations in the case.
"Highly unusual" pricing and missing ingredients
To understand why salespeople can negotiate the price of a product on the fly, NPR looked into what these items actually cost to make and what's inside them.
NPR obtained internal order forms for Voupre and Avinichi — brands owned by the Weingartens and Odeds and distributed via Mazal Group. These documents show the brands set manufacturer-suggested retail prices at up to 130 times the wholesale price they charge to stores. Voupre's Cannabis Caviar Transforming Mask, for example, costs $23 wholesale, with a suggested retail price of $3,000.
"Pricing at that level typically raises red flags," said Joe Rowett, CEO of VELOX, an Idaho-based marketing agency for skincare and beauty brands.
Well-known luxury brands rarely stretch the suggested retail price to even 20 times the wholesale cost, and most skincare brands operate far below that, Rowett said, making Voupre's suggested markups "highly unusual."
Federal investigators and former employees suggested to NPR that this wide margin gives salespeople the flexibility to negotiate the best sales price to earn maximum commission.
NPR sent a single unopened box of a Voupre "best-seller" for chemical testing. The sample — one box of one product — is limited, but the results of the analysis raise questions about what the label promises and what the product contains.
Many shoppers described being lured into a store with a sample of Voupre Anti-Aging Rescue Solution, which Mazal sells to stores for $19.50 per unit with a suggested retail price of $1,300. NPR obtained an unopened box of the solution from Suzann Roberts, a 90-year-old woman in Ann Arbor who bought the product from Beauty Essentials in 2024 and was unable to return it.
NPR sent the sample to Founders Science Group in Taunton, Massachusetts. CEO Robert Munroe has worked as a pharmaceutical scientist for three decades.
By looking at the product's ingredients list, Munroe identified three ingredients for analysis that could support Voupre's anti-aging claims: vitamin A to accelerate skin-cell turnover, vitamin E to fight collagen breakdown and acetyl hexapeptide-8, a powerful peptide that some call "Botox in a bottle."
The lab could not detect any trace of vitamin A or E, which Munroe said was "surprising and definitely suspicious." Vitamin A can degrade in strength over time without proper preservatives, he said, but it's not possible for vitamin E to disappear entirely. If the manufacturer did not include the actives at production and Voupre listed them on the packaging, he said, "that would be misbranding."
Based on what the lab detected, which included a high concentration of the peptide, Munroe said the solution is comparable to The Ordinary's 10% Argireline Solution, which retails for under $10.
"As far as getting peptide on the skin, you don't need to spend $1,300 to do it," he said.
The formula for Voupre's Anti-Aging Rescue Solution is the basis for nearly identical wrinkle creams that the Weingartens and Odeds sell across other brands like Introstem, CbGäRDN, Venofye and Lavelier.
A new company, the same family
New stores selling the Weingartens and Odeds' brands crop up regularly across the U.S. and globally, especially in port cities and tourist destinations.
Complaints haven't slowed them down, one former Mazal Group employee told NPR.
"It wasn't like it was stopping the business. They were still expanding, opening, expanding, opening, expanding, opening."
The Weingartens and Odeds have also closed companies and shuttered numerous brands over the years. Just last month, Mazal Group itself — the hub of operations for the family business — terminated its business license in California.
NPR reporters visited the Chatsworth headquarters weeks before that, in August 2026. The building, which once sported a Mazal Group logo more than 10 feet high and wide, bore a similar sign saying INV Brands.
Innovation Brands Inc. was founded by Daphna and Eli Weingarten in 2024.
"Streamlining the journey from concept to consumer," the company's website reads. "We leverage global expertise to build, manage, and scale exceptional personal care brands."
If you have information to share, you can reach Caley Fox Shannon and Monika Evstatieva on Signal at caley_fox.17 and monikanpr.38.
Additional reporting from Israel was provided by Daniel Estrin and Itay Stern. The story was edited by Barrie Hardymon and Robert Little, with additional editorial support from Arielle Retting and editorial review by Kristian Monroe. Preeti Aroon was the copy editor. Matt Pollack conducted the legal review, with additional legal support from Mayeesha Galiba.
Design and development by Connie Hanzhang Jin and Alyson Hurt, with visual editing by Emily Bogle. Mito Habe-Evans and Bronson Arcuri produced and edited the video. Mia Venkat produced the audio.
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