Connecticut
Former executive of Mars candy subsidiary pleads guilty to stealing $28M since 2013 from company
BRIDGEPORT, Conn. (AP) — A former executive for a subsidiary of candymaker Mars Inc. pleaded guilty Thursday to fraud and tax charges in connection with his theft of $28 million from the company, federal prosecutors said.
Paul Steed, 58, appeared in federal court in Bridgeport, Connecticut. He also agreed to pay $28.4 million in restitution to Mars and owes another $10 million in back taxes to the Internal Revenue Service, U.S. Attorney for Connecticut David Sullivan said in a statement.
Steed, of Stamford, Connecticut, who is free on $5 million bail, did not immediately return messages left at phone numbers and emails listed for him in public records. His lawyer, former U.S. Attorney for Connecticut Deirdre Daly, did not immediately return phone and email messages Thursday.
A dual U.S. and Argentine citizen, Steed was once a respected sugar market expert for Mars Wrigley, where his last position was global price risk manager. The company is a subsidiary of McLean, Virginia-based Mars Inc., the maker of M&M’s, Snickers, Skittles, Altoids mints and Doublemint gum, as well as other food products and pet food.
A federal indictment accused him of stealing from Mars beginning in about 2013 through various schemes, including diverting funds to companies he set up. Steed sent the lion’s share of the stolen funds, more than $26 million, to one of his companies, MCNA LLC, which was created to mimic an actual Mars company, Mars Chocolate North America, prosecutors said.
Authorities say they have seized more than $18 million from Steed’s bank accounts, and Steed has agreed to forfeit the money. The government is also seeking to liquidate a home in Greenwich, Connecticut, that Steed allegedly purchased using $2.3 million of the stolen cash. Prosecutors say Steed sent another $2 million to Argentina, where he has relatives and owns a ranch.
Steed pleaded guilty to two counts of wire fraud and one count of tax evasion. Sentencing is set for Dec. 9.
Georgia
Indictment charges church leaders with swindling millions in military benefits
SAVANNAH, Ga. (AP) — Leaders of a Georgia-based church with congregations in five states have been charged by federal prosecutors with swindling millions of dollars in veterans benefits from parishioners serving in the military.
An indictment unsealed Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Savannah charges House of Prayer Christian Churches of America founder Rony Denis and seven other church leaders with conspiring to commit bank fraud and wire fraud, as well as other federal crimes.
Authorities say church leaders exploited soldiers and other congregation members by enrolling them in seminary programs that drained their G.I. Bill education benefits. They also say church officials used parishioners’ names on fraudulent mortgage applications to buy homes that the church then rented to congregation members.
“The defendants are accused of exploiting trust, faith, and even the service of our nation’s military members to enrich themselves,” Paul Brown, the agent in charge of the FBI’s Atlanta office, said in a news release.
Prosecutors say they don’t even know the real name of Denis, alleging he assumed that name after stealing another person’s identity in 1983. He founded House of Prayer roughly two decades ago. The church is headquartered in Hinesville, a southeast Georgia city that is home to thousands of veterans and Army soldiers serving at neighboring Fort Stewart. The congregation there grew to as many as 300 members, the indictment says.
House of Prayer branched out, opening up to a dozen churches in five states, often near military bases, according to prosecutors. It also established affiliated Bible seminaries in Hinesville as well as Fayetteville, North Carolina; Killeen, Texas; and Tacoma, Washington.
The indictment says the church focused on recruiting military service members to join their congregations and pressured them to spend their G.I. Bill education benefits on enrollment in its seminary programs.
The seminaries in all four states earned House of Prayer leaders $23.5 million in G.I. Bill payments for tuition, fees, books and housing costs from 2013 and 2021, according to the indictment.
Charges against Denis and others stem from just $3.2 million of those benefit payments made to House of Prayer’s two seminaries in Georgia. That is because the programs operated in Georgia under a religious exemption granted by state regulators. Prosecutors say that exemption prohibited the Georgia seminaries from receiving federal funding — including G.I. Bill benefits from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.
The indictment says church officials lied to Georgia regulators in annual forms saying the seminaries received no federal money.
Steven Sadow, listed in court records as an attorney for Denis, did not immediately return an email message seeking comment Thursday.
A group called Veterans Education Success wrote to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs in 2020, saying former students had complained that the House of Prayer seminaries had drained their benefits while providing them with little education. FBI agents served search warrants on several House of Prayer churches in 2022, according to local news outlets.
The indictment says church officials also used its members as straw buyers to conceal the leaders’ purchase of rental properties. Prosecutors say church leaders falsified loan applications and closing documents and forged powers of attorney to buy and transfer homes that were rented to congregation members.
The indictment says House of Prayer received $5.2 million in rent payments between 2018 and 2020, with some of that money being used to pay for Denis’ two homes as well as church leaders’ credit card bills.
Denis was also charged with helping falsify his federal income tax returns for 2018, 2019 and 2020. On Wednesday, FBI agents and Columbia County sheriff’s deputies arrested the church founder at his mansion in Martinez west of Augusta, WRDW-TV reported.
In a separate case, federal prosecutors also indicted Bernadel Semexant, a pastor at the House of Prayer church in Hinesville. The indictment unsealed Wednesday charges Semexant with sex abuse of a girl between the ages of 12 and 15. William Joseph Turner, listed in court records as the pastor’s attorney, did not immediately return an email message.
Massachusetts
Appeals court allows Trump’s administration to block Medicaid funds to Planned Parenthood
BOSTON (AP) — A U.S. appeals court panel on Thursday allowed President Donald Trump’s administration to block Medicaid funds to Planned Parenthood while legal challenges continue.
A federal judge in July ruled Planned Parenthood clinics nationwide must continue to be reimbursed for Medicaid funding as the nation’s largest abortion provider fights Trump’s administration over efforts to defund the organization in his signature tax legislation.
Medicaid is a government health care program that serves millions of low-income and disabled Americans. Nearly half of Planned Parenthood’s patients rely on Medicaid.
A provision in Trump’s tax bill instructed the federal government to end Medicaid payments for one year to abortion providers that received more than $800,000 from Medicaid in 2023, even to those like Planned Parenthood that also offer medical services like contraception, pregnancy tests and STD testing.
Planned Parenthood Federation of America and its member organizations in Massachusetts and Utah filed a lawsuit in July against Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
“While the Trump administration wants to rip away reproductive freedom, we’re here to say loud and clear: we will not back down,” Dominique Lee, President and CEO of Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts said in a statement. “This is not over.”
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services didn’t immediately respond to an online request for comment.
Planned Parenthood said Thursday’s ruling means that more than 1.1 million patients can’t use their Medicaid insurance at its health centers. That also puts as many as 200 of those health centers at risk of closure, Planned Parenthood said in a statement.
Planned Parenthood says it is the nation’s leading provider and advocate of affordable sexual and reproductive health care, as well as the nation’s largest provider of sex education.
Florida
Trial date for suspect in FSU mass shooting has been postponed until next year
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — The trial of the Florida State University student accused of killing two people and wounding six others in a mass shooting on campus in April has been postponed until next year.
Phoenix Ikner, 21, faces two counts of first-degree murder and seven counts of attempted first-degree murder in the shooting that terrorized the campus in Florida’s capital city.
Ikner’s trial had been set to start the week of Nov. 3. On Wednesday, 2nd Judicial Circuit Judge Lance Neff rescheduled the proceedings to begin March 30, 2026, after the court-appointed public defender assigned to Ikner reported a conflict of interest that would prevent his office from continuing to work on the case.
Neff has since assigned new attorneys to represent Ikner, who has pleaded not guilty.
Ikner is the stepson of a local sheriff’s deputy, and investigators say he used his stepmother’s former service weapon to carry out the shooting.
Prosecutors in the case intend to seek the death penalty.
Mississippi
State sets execution date for man who killed a student in 1993
JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — The Mississippi Supreme Court on Friday set an Oct. 15 execution date for the man convicted of kidnapping and killing a college student in 1993.
Charles Ray Crawford, 59, has been on death row for more than 30 years.
Crawford was sentenced to death for fatally stabbing 20-year-old community college student Kristy Ray after abducting her from her parents’ home in northern Mississippi’s Tippah County. Crawford told officers he had blacked out and did not recall killing her.
Crawford has also been convicted of assaulting a woman by hitting her over the head with a hammer and raping a 17-year-old girl. The two victims were friends and were at the same place during the attacks. In those trials, Crawford also said he experienced blackouts and did not recall committing either the rape or hammer attack.
Crawford’s execution comes several months after the execution of Mississippi’s longest-serving death row inmate in June.
In announcing the execution date, the court also denied Crawford’s third attempt for post-conviction relief.
Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch filed papers last year asking the state Supreme Court to set a date for Crawford’s execution by lethal injection, writing that “he has exhausted all state and federal remedies.”
Former executive of Mars candy subsidiary pleads guilty to stealing $28M since 2013 from company
BRIDGEPORT, Conn. (AP) — A former executive for a subsidiary of candymaker Mars Inc. pleaded guilty Thursday to fraud and tax charges in connection with his theft of $28 million from the company, federal prosecutors said.
Paul Steed, 58, appeared in federal court in Bridgeport, Connecticut. He also agreed to pay $28.4 million in restitution to Mars and owes another $10 million in back taxes to the Internal Revenue Service, U.S. Attorney for Connecticut David Sullivan said in a statement.
Steed, of Stamford, Connecticut, who is free on $5 million bail, did not immediately return messages left at phone numbers and emails listed for him in public records. His lawyer, former U.S. Attorney for Connecticut Deirdre Daly, did not immediately return phone and email messages Thursday.
A dual U.S. and Argentine citizen, Steed was once a respected sugar market expert for Mars Wrigley, where his last position was global price risk manager. The company is a subsidiary of McLean, Virginia-based Mars Inc., the maker of M&M’s, Snickers, Skittles, Altoids mints and Doublemint gum, as well as other food products and pet food.
A federal indictment accused him of stealing from Mars beginning in about 2013 through various schemes, including diverting funds to companies he set up. Steed sent the lion’s share of the stolen funds, more than $26 million, to one of his companies, MCNA LLC, which was created to mimic an actual Mars company, Mars Chocolate North America, prosecutors said.
Authorities say they have seized more than $18 million from Steed’s bank accounts, and Steed has agreed to forfeit the money. The government is also seeking to liquidate a home in Greenwich, Connecticut, that Steed allegedly purchased using $2.3 million of the stolen cash. Prosecutors say Steed sent another $2 million to Argentina, where he has relatives and owns a ranch.
Steed pleaded guilty to two counts of wire fraud and one count of tax evasion. Sentencing is set for Dec. 9.
Georgia
Indictment charges church leaders with swindling millions in military benefits
SAVANNAH, Ga. (AP) — Leaders of a Georgia-based church with congregations in five states have been charged by federal prosecutors with swindling millions of dollars in veterans benefits from parishioners serving in the military.
An indictment unsealed Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Savannah charges House of Prayer Christian Churches of America founder Rony Denis and seven other church leaders with conspiring to commit bank fraud and wire fraud, as well as other federal crimes.
Authorities say church leaders exploited soldiers and other congregation members by enrolling them in seminary programs that drained their G.I. Bill education benefits. They also say church officials used parishioners’ names on fraudulent mortgage applications to buy homes that the church then rented to congregation members.
“The defendants are accused of exploiting trust, faith, and even the service of our nation’s military members to enrich themselves,” Paul Brown, the agent in charge of the FBI’s Atlanta office, said in a news release.
Prosecutors say they don’t even know the real name of Denis, alleging he assumed that name after stealing another person’s identity in 1983. He founded House of Prayer roughly two decades ago. The church is headquartered in Hinesville, a southeast Georgia city that is home to thousands of veterans and Army soldiers serving at neighboring Fort Stewart. The congregation there grew to as many as 300 members, the indictment says.
House of Prayer branched out, opening up to a dozen churches in five states, often near military bases, according to prosecutors. It also established affiliated Bible seminaries in Hinesville as well as Fayetteville, North Carolina; Killeen, Texas; and Tacoma, Washington.
The indictment says the church focused on recruiting military service members to join their congregations and pressured them to spend their G.I. Bill education benefits on enrollment in its seminary programs.
The seminaries in all four states earned House of Prayer leaders $23.5 million in G.I. Bill payments for tuition, fees, books and housing costs from 2013 and 2021, according to the indictment.
Charges against Denis and others stem from just $3.2 million of those benefit payments made to House of Prayer’s two seminaries in Georgia. That is because the programs operated in Georgia under a religious exemption granted by state regulators. Prosecutors say that exemption prohibited the Georgia seminaries from receiving federal funding — including G.I. Bill benefits from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.
The indictment says church officials lied to Georgia regulators in annual forms saying the seminaries received no federal money.
Steven Sadow, listed in court records as an attorney for Denis, did not immediately return an email message seeking comment Thursday.
A group called Veterans Education Success wrote to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs in 2020, saying former students had complained that the House of Prayer seminaries had drained their benefits while providing them with little education. FBI agents served search warrants on several House of Prayer churches in 2022, according to local news outlets.
The indictment says church officials also used its members as straw buyers to conceal the leaders’ purchase of rental properties. Prosecutors say church leaders falsified loan applications and closing documents and forged powers of attorney to buy and transfer homes that were rented to congregation members.
The indictment says House of Prayer received $5.2 million in rent payments between 2018 and 2020, with some of that money being used to pay for Denis’ two homes as well as church leaders’ credit card bills.
Denis was also charged with helping falsify his federal income tax returns for 2018, 2019 and 2020. On Wednesday, FBI agents and Columbia County sheriff’s deputies arrested the church founder at his mansion in Martinez west of Augusta, WRDW-TV reported.
In a separate case, federal prosecutors also indicted Bernadel Semexant, a pastor at the House of Prayer church in Hinesville. The indictment unsealed Wednesday charges Semexant with sex abuse of a girl between the ages of 12 and 15. William Joseph Turner, listed in court records as the pastor’s attorney, did not immediately return an email message.
Massachusetts
Appeals court allows Trump’s administration to block Medicaid funds to Planned Parenthood
BOSTON (AP) — A U.S. appeals court panel on Thursday allowed President Donald Trump’s administration to block Medicaid funds to Planned Parenthood while legal challenges continue.
A federal judge in July ruled Planned Parenthood clinics nationwide must continue to be reimbursed for Medicaid funding as the nation’s largest abortion provider fights Trump’s administration over efforts to defund the organization in his signature tax legislation.
Medicaid is a government health care program that serves millions of low-income and disabled Americans. Nearly half of Planned Parenthood’s patients rely on Medicaid.
A provision in Trump’s tax bill instructed the federal government to end Medicaid payments for one year to abortion providers that received more than $800,000 from Medicaid in 2023, even to those like Planned Parenthood that also offer medical services like contraception, pregnancy tests and STD testing.
Planned Parenthood Federation of America and its member organizations in Massachusetts and Utah filed a lawsuit in July against Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
“While the Trump administration wants to rip away reproductive freedom, we’re here to say loud and clear: we will not back down,” Dominique Lee, President and CEO of Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts said in a statement. “This is not over.”
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services didn’t immediately respond to an online request for comment.
Planned Parenthood said Thursday’s ruling means that more than 1.1 million patients can’t use their Medicaid insurance at its health centers. That also puts as many as 200 of those health centers at risk of closure, Planned Parenthood said in a statement.
Planned Parenthood says it is the nation’s leading provider and advocate of affordable sexual and reproductive health care, as well as the nation’s largest provider of sex education.
Florida
Trial date for suspect in FSU mass shooting has been postponed until next year
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — The trial of the Florida State University student accused of killing two people and wounding six others in a mass shooting on campus in April has been postponed until next year.
Phoenix Ikner, 21, faces two counts of first-degree murder and seven counts of attempted first-degree murder in the shooting that terrorized the campus in Florida’s capital city.
Ikner’s trial had been set to start the week of Nov. 3. On Wednesday, 2nd Judicial Circuit Judge Lance Neff rescheduled the proceedings to begin March 30, 2026, after the court-appointed public defender assigned to Ikner reported a conflict of interest that would prevent his office from continuing to work on the case.
Neff has since assigned new attorneys to represent Ikner, who has pleaded not guilty.
Ikner is the stepson of a local sheriff’s deputy, and investigators say he used his stepmother’s former service weapon to carry out the shooting.
Prosecutors in the case intend to seek the death penalty.
Mississippi
State sets execution date for man who killed a student in 1993
JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — The Mississippi Supreme Court on Friday set an Oct. 15 execution date for the man convicted of kidnapping and killing a college student in 1993.
Charles Ray Crawford, 59, has been on death row for more than 30 years.
Crawford was sentenced to death for fatally stabbing 20-year-old community college student Kristy Ray after abducting her from her parents’ home in northern Mississippi’s Tippah County. Crawford told officers he had blacked out and did not recall killing her.
Crawford has also been convicted of assaulting a woman by hitting her over the head with a hammer and raping a 17-year-old girl. The two victims were friends and were at the same place during the attacks. In those trials, Crawford also said he experienced blackouts and did not recall committing either the rape or hammer attack.
Crawford’s execution comes several months after the execution of Mississippi’s longest-serving death row inmate in June.
In announcing the execution date, the court also denied Crawford’s third attempt for post-conviction relief.
Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch filed papers last year asking the state Supreme Court to set a date for Crawford’s execution by lethal injection, writing that “he has exhausted all state and federal remedies.”
