Court Digest

Arizona
Caregivers get prison terms for defrauding victim
TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) — Two caregivers have been sentenced to prison for defrauding a 73-year-old homebound victim in Tucson, according to authorities.

Federal prosecutors said 34-year-old Michael Tagle Santos was given a 33-month sentence while 28-year-old Cherry Mae De Los Reyes-Santos got a 16-month prison term.

A U.S. District Court judge in Tucson also ordered the married couple to pay an undisclosed amount of restitution to the victim.

Prosecutors say Santos previously pleaded guilty to wire fraud, and his wife pleaded guilty to misrepresentation of a felony.

Between 2013 and 2018, authorities said the couple made unauthorized transfers of the victim's funds.

They said Santos admitted that he and his wife fraudulently disguised the transfers to make them appear as wage advances, gifts and reimbursements for medical and grocery expenses of the disabled victim.

The couple used the fraudulently obtained proceeds to buy expensive cars, trips to Las Vegas, high-end jewelry and home remodeling, according to prosecutors.

New Hampshire
Domestic violence case under review, task force being formed
CONCORD, N.H. (AP) — New Hampshire's judicial branch is conducting a review in the case of a woman who was shot, allegedly by her ex-boyfriend, a month after a judge denied her request for a protective order, and is forming a task force to review domestic violence cases in the court system.

The woman was shot Monday in Salem, Massachusetts, and was in critical condition in a Boston hospital. The man, who had lived in New Hampshire, died from an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound, police said.

The woman had obtained a temporary restraining order against the man in September alleging that he sexually and physically abused her for years. A month later, a New Hampshire judge dismissed the woman's petition for a permanent order, writing "the court cannot find that the defendant's conduct constitutes a credible present threat to plaintiff's safety."

New Hampshire Supreme Court Chief Justice Gordon MacDonald called for the internal review of the petition denial. It's expected to be completed next week and is being led by Circuit Court Judge Susan Carbon, former director of the Office on Violence Against Women at the U.S. Department of Justice.

The task force will be led by state Supreme Court Associate Justice Anna Barbara Hantz and include representatives from the New Hampshire Coalition Against Domestic and Sexual Violence, law enforcement, prosecutors, defense counsel, and others.

"What happened ... is an absolute tragedy and my thoughts and prayers are with her and her family," Gov. Chris Sununu said earlier in a statement. "As soon as this was brought to our attention, I immediately contacted the judicial branch and confirmed this matter is being reviewed to the fullest extent possible."


California
Man gets prison for Bitcoin money laundering
SANTA ANA, Calif. (AP) — A Southern California man was sentenced to three years in federal prison for operating an unlicensed business that exchanged at least $13 million in Bitcoin and cash, the U.S. Attorney's Office said.

Hugo Mejia, 50, of Ontario purposefully flouted money exchange regulations and structured his business to establish an anonymous conduit for money laundering of drug trafficking proceeds, federal prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memorandum.

U.S. District Judge Cormac J. Carney sentenced Mejia on Thursday. Mejia pleaded guilty in July to one count of operating an unlicensed money transmitting business and one count of money laundering.

Prosecutors said that from May 2018 to September 2020, Mejia exchanged Bitcoin for cash, and vice versa, and charged commissions for the transactions.

The business was never registered with the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, a Treasury Department bureau that combats financial crimes, including money laundering.

Connecticut
Police: New DNA tests link woman to 1986 baby killing
GREENWICH, Conn. (AP) — Connecticut police charged a Florida woman with murder Friday in connection with the 1986 killing of a baby who was found dead in a garbage truck, after new DNA testing linked her to the crime scene, authorities said.

Janita Philips, 62, of Lake Mary, Florida, turned herself in to Greenwich police and was detained on $50,000 bail pending a court hearing Friday, police said. Police said Philips was the mother of the child. It was not immediately clear if she had a lawyer who could respond to the allegations.

"We are grateful that justice is finally being obtained for this infant child of our community," Deputy Police Chief Robert Berry said in a statement. "The investigation of his tragic death has taken many long years, but he has always been remembered and we hope this conclusion will bring him peace and recognition."

The infant boy was found dead in a garbage truck that had emptied a dumpster at an apartment complex in Greenwich on May 16, 1986. The chief medical examiner's office determined the baby was strangled and ruled his death a homicide. The boy was born alive and killed soon after birth, officials said.

Police said they found items soaked with blood and other evidence at the crime scene, and they interviewed residents of the apartment building. But nothing positively identified the killer.

Greenwich police said they used newly available DNA testing last year that linked evidence found at the crime scene to the boy's mother. Detectives investigated further and determined Philips was his mother, which was confirmed through additional DNA testing, police said.

Philips lived at the Greenwich apartment building at the time of the killing, authorities said.

In September, Greenwich detectives went to Florida and interviewed Philips with help from the Seminole County Sheriff's Office.

Philips admitted during the interview and in a written statement that she was the child's mother and caused his death, police said. Detectives obtained an arrest warrant for her Wednesday.

Missouri
Man sentenced to life for 2018 cab driver killing
ST. LOUIS (AP) — A St. Louis man has been sentenced to life in prison for fatally shooting a cab driver in 2018 and stealing the driver's minivan.

James Flannel was sentenced Thursday in federal court, more than two years after he pleaded guilty to one count of discharging a firearm in furtherance of carjacking, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported.

Flannel admitted to shooting 66-year-old Boris Iouioukine on June 25, 2018, and leaving Iouioukine for dead on a St. Louis street. Flannel's sentencing was repeatedly delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic and his lawyer's attempts to get more information about abuse he suffered as a child.

Iouioukine's family told a federal judge overseeing the case that Iouioukine grew up poor in Russia and worked as an interpreter and translator until he moved to the U.S. in the late 1980s. He was was a driver for Laclede Cab when he was killed.

Flannel still faces federal and state charges after being accused of breaking out of the Lincoln County jail  in July 2019 with another inmate, carjacking a vehicle and crashing it in St. Louis County during a police chase. Flannel's co-defendant in that case, Kurt Wallace, is accused of federal crimes connected to the 2017 killing of a St. Louis man, Ladareace Pool, and the fatal carjacking that killed De Smet Jesuit High School assistant football coach Jaz Granderson.


Arizona
Woman who ran stash house for migrants pleads guilty
TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) — A 43-year-old Phoenix woman who admitted supervising a stash house for migrants who entered the U.S. illegally awaits sentencing after pleading guilty to a human smuggling charge.

A Feb. 1 sentencing is set in federal court in Tucson for Amalia Gonzalez-Lara on her guilty plea Thursday to one count of conspiracy to transport and harbor migrants who are in the country illegally.

The conspiracy charge is punishable by up to 10 years in prison. But a plea agreement between Gonzalez-Lara and federal prosecutors said a sentence of 4.75 years would be the maximum she should face under federal guidelines.

The plea agreement said federal agents found 20 migrants, all from Mexico or Guatemala, inside a home in the Phoenix suburb of Avondale on Jan. 12 and that the migrants had been transported through southern Arizona en route to metro Phoenix.

Gonzalez-Lara admitted in the plea agreement that she "managed and coordinated stash house and transportation operations for at least 100 illegal aliens."

A co-conspirator, Sergio Vazquez-Flores, 46, of Goodyear, faces a Jan. 25 sentencing after pleading guilty to the same conspiracy charge on Nov. 5.

Missouri
Nonprofit operator indicted on 5 felony counts
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — The operator of a nonprofit group set up as job re-entry program for ex-cons has been indicted on five federal counts after investigators accused him of running an employment scheme.

Prosecutors say Michael Green, operator of Kansas City Community Source, took money from ex-cons in exchange for falsely reporting to federal probation officers that the felons worked for the nonprofit.

Green, 50, is also accused of creating false employment verification documents, including pay stubs, as part of the scheme, which the felons used to satisfy requirements of supervised release.

Green is also accused of selling fake documents and IDs, including driver's licenses, to felons.

Green is charged with three counts of making false statements to probation officers in relation to three separate people, one count of transferring a false identification document and one count of providing false documents to a probation officer.

Pennsylvania
4 teens charged with ethnic intimidation in subway attack
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Four teens are accused of ethnic intimidation and other charges in what police said was a racial attack on a city subway.

The teens, who range in age from 13 to 16, are Black and police said they targeted four Asian American students from Central High School.

Video posted on social media showed the teens on Wednesday yelling at three students when a fourth stepped in and told them to stop, SEPTA Police Chief Thomas Nestel III said. The suspects attacked her, banging her head against the subway doors and hitting her as she lay on the floor.

Nestle said she was "was a hero" and did not not suffer serious injuries.

"There is no indication at this point that there was any provocation on the part of the victims," Nestel said.

The four were charged Thursday as juveniles with aggravated assault, ethnic intimidation, criminal conspiracy and disorderly conduct. Their names were not released because of their ages.