A tidbit more to the story above.

When I joined Criket Wireless, they sold me an iPhone7 for $199.00 + tax which came to $217. When I bought the iPhone at the Apple store, it was $399 for an iPhone10.5. It had been only four months since the bought the iPhone7 and it wa no longer available anywhere to purchase. When i charged-back the phone on my credit card, essentially getting all of $217 back for the iPhone7, Apple offered to buy the iPhone7 from me for $140. I sold it to Apple.

So the iPhone10.5 which cost $399 essentially really only coat me $42 because of the $217 charge-back refund and the $140, Apple gave me for the locked Cricket iPhone7. I'm sure Apple simply unlocked the iPhone7 and resold the phone to someone else.

Contrarian, extraordinaire