New York Paralegal Blog

Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance, Jr., today announced the indictment of STEVEN CARTER, 49, for the rape and murder of Antoinette Bennett in 1986. The crime remained unsolved for 24 years, but the case was reopened last year by the Manhattan DA’s Forensic Sciences/Cold Case Unit, which was created in April 2010 and is reviewing thousands of unsolved homicides dating back to the 1970s. After a thorough re-examination of evidence and the use of new forensic techniques, investigators from the District Attorney’s Office uncovered sufficient evidence to charge CARTER with murder. CARTER is charged with two counts of Murder in the Second Degree, including one count of murder for causing the victim’s death during the commission of a felony rape.[1] “The Office’s new Cold Case Unit uses advances in DNA technology to solve homicides,” said District Attorney Vance. “The victim’s valiant fight for her life—in which she clawed at her attacker, scraping his skin—made today’s indictment...

MILWAUKEE – Chrysler Group, LLC will pay $60,000 under a consent decree resolving a retaliation lawsuit brought by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) which was entered by the federal court in Milwaukee today. The EEOC sued Chrysler in December 2009 for unlawfully retaliating against two women after they opposed sex discrimination at Chrysler’s national parts distribution center in Milwaukee. (EEOC v. Chrysler Group, LLC, No. 08-C-1067 (E.D. Wis.). The events underlying this lawsuit, the EEOC said, began when Chrysler’s second-shift supervisor at the Milwaukee facility removed one of the women from the coveted position of driving a power sweeper and assigned her to gather parts in the “back order release” area. When this woman and a female coworker questioned why a male employee with less seniority was not assigned to the less desirable job of “picking” parts, the EEOC said, Chrysler’s plant manager accused each woman of disrupting the work force and threatened th...

WASHINGTON - In a chartered flight that originated in Miami Thursday, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) returned 73 aliens, including 69 convicted criminals, to the Dominican Republic. Those removed included three convicted of murder, two convicted of sex offenses and one who was wanted for murder in the Dominican Republic. ICE's Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) Air Operations Unit coordinated the flight that returned the 73 Dominican males to Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. These individuals came into ICE custody from locations throughout the United States. They were housed at various detention facilities across the country before being transported to the Oakdale Federal Detention Center in Louisiana or the Krome Service Processing Center in Miami before being removed.

DULLES, Va. - In less than one week, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers, along with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) agents, arrested two Nigerian men allegedly attempting to smuggle heroin inside their persons. Both were arrested at Washington Dulles International Airport. "ICE HSI agents and CBP officers continue their close collaboration to ensure that drug smugglers are identified and apprehended," said John P. Torres, special agent in charge of ICE HSI in Washington, D.C. "ICE HSI is committed to working with our federal, state and local partners to investigate those individuals and organizations that attempt to exploit perceived vulnerabilities at our borders."

WASHINGTON—Oladayo Oladokun, 37, was sentenced today to two years of imprisonment for carrying out a scheme in which he took over financial accounts belonging to about 25 victims. In total, more than 40 financial accounts were taken over, fraudulently used, possessed, or opened without the victims’ authorization, causing more than $300,000 in losses. Oladokun, most recently of Lanham, Md., pled guilty in February 2011 to a charge of aggravated identity theft. He was sentenced today by the Honorable Ellen S. Huvelle in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. In addition to the prison term, the judge ordered Oladokun to pay restitution of $269,304. He will be on one year of supervised release upon completion of the prison term.

NEW YORK, NY (October 6, 2009) - Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo today announced two guilty pleas in the ongoing investigation relating to the New York State Common Retirement Fund (“CRF”). Raymond Harding, the former chair of the Liberal Party, and Saul Meyer, a founding partner of a Dallas-based firm that advises public pension systems across the nation, both pled guilty to felony securities fraud charges for their involvement in pay-to-play kickback schemes at the New York State Office of the Comptroller and the CRF. “These guilty pleas vividly depict the depth and breadth of corruption involving the New York State pension fund,” said Attorney General Cuomo. “In one case, we see New York’s state pension fund looted to reward a political boss with hundreds of thousands of dollars in improper payments. In the other, we see a pension fund adviser - the outside “gatekeeper” who is supposed to safeguard the integrity of the pension fund process - recommending deals based on pressure fro...

WASHINGTON – Two men pleaded guilty today to traveling, and conspiring to travel, in foreign commerce with the intent to engage in illicit sexual conduct with children, Acting Assistant Attorney General of the Criminal Division Matthew Friedrich and U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Alabama Deborah J. Rhodes announced. During the plea hearing before U.S. District Judge Kristi K. DuBose, Burgess Lee Burgess, 44, of Mobile, Ala., and Mitchell Kent Jackson, 31, of Pensacola, Fla., both admitted that they traveled to Thailand between 2000 and 2002. According to their pleas, Burgess and Jackson traveled with the intent to sexually abuse children, paid for access to children and in fact sexually abused children. More...

WASHINGTON – Helio Castroneves, a U.S. resident and two-time winner of the Indianapolis 500, was indicted by a grand jury today on charges of conspiracy to defraud the United States of income taxes and with six separate counts of income tax evasion for tax years 1999 through 2004, announced the Justice Department, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida R. Alexander Acosta and Internal Revenue Service-Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI) Special Agent-in-Charge Michael E. Yasofsky Jr. Also charged in the indictment were Helio Castroneves’ sister and business manager, Katiucia Castroneves of Miami, and his attorney, Alan R. Miller of Michigan. Count one of the indictment charges Helio Castroneves, Katiucia Castroneves and Miller with conspiring to defraud the United States by using an offshore Panamanian shell corporation – Seven Promotions Corporation (Seven Promotions) – to fraudulently conceal from the IRS income received from two sources: Coimex Internacional SA (Coimex) and P...

Under the terms of a settlement announced by the Federal Trade Commission today, a list broker, formerly based in Arizona, and the two companies he ran have agreed to a proposed court order barring them from violating the agency’s Telemarketing Sales Rule (TSR). The proposed order settles a Commission complaint charging that the defendants assisted and facilitated telemarketers of fraudulent “advance-fee” credit cards by providing them with unencrypted consumer information. The FTC complaint alleged the defendants sold “full data leads” to these telemarketers that included consumers’ bank account and routing information, credit card numbers, credit card security codes, and credit card expiration dates, without first obtaining authorization from consumers to do so, all the while knowing that the data would be used in schemes designed to mislead and defraud consumers. The proposed order also contains a suspended $120,000 judgment against the defendants. The full judgment will be imposed ...

WASHINGTON – Steven Sandstrom, 23, and Gary L. Eye, 22, both of Kansas City, Mo., received multiple life sentences today for the racially-motivated murder of William McCay on March 9, 2005. The defendants were convicted on May 8, 2008. Today’s announcement was made jointly by Grace Chung Becker, Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, and John F. Wood, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Missouri. “Acts of violence motivated by race and hate tear at the fabric of our communities and destroy our faith in the ability of people to transcend their differences,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Becker. “It is imperative that hate crimes, like the murder of Mr. McCay, are not tolerated by our society, and the Justice Department will do its part by committing to continue its vigorous prosecution of such abhorrent violent acts of hate.” More...