Sherwin Shayegan, 34, may be one of the truly creepiest individuals to make it on a police blotter, if New Jersey prosecutors are correct. Shayegan gave a 14-year-old boy a spontaneous massage at the Newark International Airport last Friday as he sat near a luggage carousel. He then gave the boy a note with a $10 bill. It turns out that Shayegan has a long, bizarre, and deeply disturbing history.
Pudit Kittithradilok, 34, was found guilty to running a Ponzi scheme based on investors artificially high financial returns. A defendant would normally be delighted by a fifty percent reduction in his sentence, but Kittithradilok was sentenced to more than 13,000 years in prison. His reduction left him with a hefty remainder of 6,637 years and six months. Even with regular workouts in the prison yard, it would seem difficult to serve that time.
Below is my column in The Hill newspaper on the status of the Russian investigation and a look back at the various crimes alleged over the year. A brief search of mainstream media found roughly 5000 stories referring to “bombshell” developments. However, the status has changed little over the year. That could, of course, change. We do not know what Special Counsel Robert Mueller had in terms of new evidence. That did not stop many from declaring conclusive evidence supporting charges over the year despite the paucity of evidence. While we have had four indictments or pleas, but the charges are been notably removed from the core purpose of the Russian collusion investigation. The point of the column is not that new charges are unlikely but that there is little public evidence supporting such charges at the end of 2017. CNN reported yet another “bombshell” discovery this week: George Papadopoulos told an Australian diplomat that Russia had “political dirt” on Hillary Clinton in May of last year. However, there has to be more than knowledge of such hacking (or even a desire to use the results of hacking) to support even a collateral criminal charge. We could certainly reach that point in 2018 but the evidence remains sketchy on specific criminal acts tied to Trump or his closest aides related to Russia.
Here is the column:
Continue reading “A Year Later, An Investigation In Search Of A Crime”
Ever wonder who is behind those email messages from Nigerian princes promising millions if you could just send some money to help him release his fortune? Well, meet Michale Neu, allegedly a 67-year-old “Nigerian Prince” from Slidell, Louisiana. Neu was arrested and charged with 269 counts of wire fraud and money laundering by the Slidell Police Department’s Financial Crimes Division after a long investigation into an Internet scam.
Danny Kay, 26, will greet the New Year as a free man after being convicted of a rape that was based on altered evidence submitted by the alleged victim. His freedom is due not to police work but the work of his sister in law Sarah Maddison. Maddison decided to take a minute and look at the Facebook messages sent between Kay and the unnamed woman who accused him of rape. What she found was that the police used messages that were misleadingly edited by the woman and that the real messages directly contradicted her claims. The police revealed an utter incompetence in the investigation and the prosecutors have expressed no intent in looking at possible charges against the woman who is accused of changing the meaning of the messages from exculpatory to incriminating. This follows an equally shocking reversal where the police were found to have withheld 40,000 messages from the defense in another rape case.
Michael Wilson, 32, is accused of an extraordinary crime in rigging his front door to electrocute his estranged, pregnant wife. Police found the booby trap and arrested Wilson, who is now charged with attempted aggravated battery on a pregnant person and theft of a firearm. (The gun charge is related to his taking his father-in-law’s gun from his wife’s house).
Continue reading “Florida Man Arrested After Allegedly Trying To Electrocute His Estranged Wife”
When Wilmer Lara Garcia allegedly decided to steal a Honda Civic, he wore a rather incongruous choice of teeshirt reading “Trust Me.” He did leave a memorable mugshot however with the Fairfax County police.
Continue reading “Virginia Man Features “Trust Me” Teeshirt in His Mugshot For Auto Theft”
To a layman, the concerns of an attorney can seem quaint or overblown. To an attorney, discussions with a layman can present a problem of translation. That seemed to be the case in a dispute recently between Lindy Lou Layman and well-known attorney Anthony Buzbee. Buzbee took Layman, 29, home after a first date. She was drunk and allegedly proceeded to trash his home — causing more than $300,000 in damage to art including two Andy Warhol paintings.
Michael Joseph Oleksik, 23, has a curious crime alleged in Florida. He reportedly became upset when an ATM machine gave him too much money so he proceeded to pummel the machine. It is not clear why he was enraged by being over-paid, but any concern for the bank’s assets did not extend to the machine itself.
Continue reading “Man Arrested For Beating Up ATM Machine After Being Given Too Much Money”
In Minnesota, there is a troubling case brought by Rice County Attorney John Fossum who has confirmed that he has charged a 14-year-old girl with felony child pornography for sending a fellow teen a selfie of herself. In such a twisted logic, the child is both the victim and the felon of child pornography.
Continue reading “Minnesota Teen Charged With Child Pornography For Sending Selfie”
A feminist activist from the extremist group Femen ran onto the Nativity scene in St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican on Monday and tried to steal the baby Jesus. The woman screaming “God is woman” was tackled by Vatican gendarme. The group identified the culprit as Alisa Vinogradova and proudly declared her to be a “sextremist”. This is not the only effort his season to “jack” Jesus. These cases represent a convergence of the Corpus delicti and the Corpus Christi.
Below is my column in the Hill Newspaper on an annual list of Christmas torts and mishaps. Santas feature prominently this year.
Continue reading “Christmas Torts: The 2018 Listing Of Holiday Mishaps and Madness”
There is an interesting hearing to be held in Minneapolis where a court will decide whether a new trial is warranted for Michael Smith, who has a record of offenses including fourth-degree assault convictions in 2005 and 2006. He is challenging his conviction four years ago after two jurors have stated that their votes were swayed by another juror calling him a “banger from the hood.” While statements of prosecutors are often the basis for post-conviction appeals, this is a statement from other jurors in deliberations that are rarely the subject of such detailed review.
Glen Alveris has a curious way of impressing a girl. He first shot an innocent woman walking her dog to impress his girlfriend with how “crazy” he was and then stabbed the girlfriend when we was clearly not impressed enough. He is likely to impress the heck out of a jury in New Orleans.
The testimony of Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe appears to have gone long but came up short on details. According to sources on the Committee, McCabe stated that he could not recall critical details on the famous dossier that was funded by the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee. The dossier contained information given to a former British spy by Russian government and other sources, including salacious details against then candidate Donald Trump. I have repeatedly stated that I do not agree that the current facts warrant the calls for the firing of McCabe. However, some of the gaps in his testimony are likely to trigger a new round of subpoenas to dive deeper into these issues.
Continue reading “McCabe Testimony Triggers New Round Of Congressional Subpoenas”