New York Paralegal Blog

Officer Allowed Inmates to Use Cell Phone to Communicate with Dangerous Rikers Island Inmate Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance, Jr., today announced the indictment and arraignment of New York City Correction Officer ROSALYN WILKES, 43, in Manhattan Supreme Court on five counts of Promoting Prison Contraband in the First Degree, a class D felony, for using, and allowing inmates to use, a cellular telephone inside the Manhattan Detention Center. “Correction Officers have enormous power and an equal responsibility to keep our jails safe, and our inmates secure,” said District Attorney Vance. “By violating basic rules of conduct, this defendant put her needs and the desires of inmates above the safety of her colleagues, the inmate population, and the public. I thank our partners at the Department of Investigation for their extensive work on this case.”

At the request of the Federal Trade Commission, a federal judge has shut down an operation that allegedly posed as the U.S. government, then duped consumers into paying fees ranging from $200 to $2,500 by claiming the fees would cover processing by the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services. The court froze the defendants’ assets and appointed a receiver to take over the business until the case is resolved. The FTC has asked the court to halt the business practices permanently and order the operation to repay its victims. The real U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS), a division of the Department of Homeland Security, offers advice and counseling to immigrants in the United States and people seeking to immigrate to the United States. USCIS provides application forms for such benefits as green card renewal, work visas, and applications for asylum. The application forms are free but can cost hundreds or thousands of dollars to process.

"What Would You Do?" hired actors to play a racist store clerk and security guard, both armed with words that would make even the most apathetic shopper flinch. An actor was hired to pose as the black shopper, the target of the abuse. (ABC News)

LOS ANGELES—Special Agents with the FBI and the United States Postal Inspection Service arrested a Claremont man this morning on federal charges of sending threatening letters containing a powdery substance to multiple offices of the Department of Children and Family Services and the Los Angeles County Children's Courthouse over a period of approximately 18 months. Martin Calvin Yarbrough Jr., 48, was taken into custody at his residence this morning without incident after being indicted by a federal grand jury on Tuesday. The indictment charges Yarbrough with 13 counts of making threats and hoaxes.

An operator of an online “scareware” scheme will pay more than $8 million to settle Federal Trade Commission charges that he used deceptive ads to trick consumers into thinking their computers were infected with malicious software, and then sold them software to “fix” their non-existent problem. As part of the FTC’s ongoing efforts to protect consumers from online scams, the agency cracked down on the scareware operation, filing a complaint against seven defendants who allegedly operated the scheme in 2008. The agency charged that the defendants did business using the company names Innovative Marketing, Inc. and ByteHosting Internet Services, LLC, operated using a variety of aliases, and maintained offices in various countries.

DA's Cold Case Unit Secures Murder Charges More than Thirty Years Later Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance, Jr., today announced the indictment of RODNEY ALCALA, 67, a/k/a JOHN BERGER, on Murder charges in the deaths of Cornelia Crilley and Ellen Hover. Decades after these crimes occurred, the Manhattan District Attorney's Cold Case Unit presented these cases to the Grand Jury, which indicted ALCALA on murder charges for both Ms. Crilley and Ms. Hover. "Cold cases are not forgotten cases -- our prosecutors, investigators, and partners in the NYPD do not give up," said District Attorney Vance. "These cases were built one brick at a time, as each new lead brought us closer to where we are today. Last year, this Office's Cold Case Unit began an exhaustive re-examination of these two homicides, including a full re-investigation of evidence, and new interviews with more than 100 witnesses. This re-focus on these cases, combined with information made av...

David B. Fein, today announced that JASON BETENSKY, 27, of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, formerly of Florida, pleaded guilty on Monday, January 24, before United States District Judge Christopher F. Droney in Hartford to one count of using the internet to entice a minor to engage in illicit sexual activity. As part of his guilty plea, BETENSKY admitted that he coerced, and then threatened, minors to send him sexually explicit images of themselves over the Internet. “This defendant engaged in a lengthy, manipulative scheme during which he tricked many minor victims to send him sexually explicit images of themselves over the Internet,” stated U.S. Attorney Fein. “The federal penalties for this type of crime are appropriately severe. I want to thank the FBI and all the members of the Connecticut Computer Crimes Task Force for their efforts in bringing Mr. Betensky and other individuals who exploit children to justice. I also want to commend the Jupiter Police Department in Jupiter, Florid...

WASHINGTON – A Detroit-area patient recruiter was sentenced today to 40 months in prison for his role in a conspiracy to defraud the Medicare program, the Departments of Justice and Health and Human Services (HHS) announced today. Melvin Young, 57, was also sentenced by U.S. District Judge Patrick J. Duggan in the Eastern District of Michigan to three years of supervised release following his prison term and was ordered to pay restitution, joint and several with co-defendants, in the amount of $533,643. Young pleaded guilty in April 2010 to one count of conspiracy to commit health care fraud.

The Federal Trade Commission, the nation’s consumer protection agency, has reached a settlement with an Internet marketer and its manager that will put a stop to their alleged illegal practice of selling cosmetic contact lenses to consumers without prescriptions. The settlement with Da Young Kim and Gothic Lens LLC requires them to pay a civil penalty of $50,000. Kim will sell her 2008 BMW in partial satisfaction of the judgment, and the rest will suspended because of the defendants’ inability to pay.

Defendant Compromised the Identities of More Than 750 People Across the U.S. Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance, Jr., today announced the sentencing of IGUOSADE OSAHON, 28, to three to nine years in state prison, for stealing more than $500,000 by exploiting stolen identity information over a three-year period. OSAHON was ordered to pay restitution in the amount of approximately $250,000, and also forfeited $50,000 worth of assets in the form of cash and vehicles. On December 8, 2010, OSAHON pleaded guilty to the top four counts in the indictment: Computer Tampering in the First Degree, Grand Larceny in the Second Degree, Identity Theft in the First Degree, and Scheme to Defraud in the First Degree. “Over the course of three years, the defendant carried out a sophisticated online identity theft scheme that netted him a small personal fortune,” said District Attorney Vance. “He then proceeded to squander the funds he stole from more than 750 hard-working individuals on jewel...