Missouri
Former Ferguson officer gets probation in man’s beating
ST. LOUIS, Mo. (AP) — A federal judge on Wednesday sentenced a former Ferguson police officer to three years of probation for filing a false police report after he hit a handcuffed man several times.
Jackie Matthews, 63, pleaded guilty in January to beating the man, identified as “G.R.,” in March 2020 after police responded to a domestic disturbance call.
Court filings said G.R. was handcuffed and sitting in Matthews’ patrol car when they two men began arguing, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported.
Eventually, Matthews hit G.R. several times in the face, according to prosecutors.
Matthews filed an incident report claiming G.R. was kicking the car, lunged toward him and spit in his face, court documents said.
Matthews’ body camera contradicted those claims, and he was fired by Ferguson police in May 2020 — about a year after he joined the force.
A civil rights charge of deprivation of rights was dismissed as part of the plea agreement.
Missouri
Former prosecutor accused in federal indictment
ST. LOUIS (AP) — A former prosecutor in eastern Missouri is accused in a federal indictment of making sexual contact with a woman who was a defendant in several cases he was prosecuting.
The U.S. Department of Justice on Wednesday announced the indictment of James Isaac Crabtree on one count of deprivation of rights under color of the law, and one count of making false statements to the FBI. He served as the municipal prosecutor for Jefferson County, near St. Louis, until he resigned in March amid the federal investigation.
Federal authorities say the incident happened March 8 when Crabtree met with the woman in his office. He allegedly kissed and touched the woman and had her remove some of her clothing. Authorities say Crabtree lied about the incident in an interview with the FBI.
It wasn’t immediately clear if Crabtree had an attorney.
Florida
Woman gets prison time for failed hitman scheme
TAMPA, Fla. (AP) — A 51-year-old Tampa woman has been sentenced to 6 ½ years in prison for attempting to hire a hitman on the dark web to kill her ex-boyfriend’s wife.
U.S. District Judge Steven Merryday also ordered DeAnna Marie Stinson to serve three years of supervised release and to pay more than $12,000 in restitution and a fine.
The judge noted it was difficult to determine the right sentence for the highly educated churchgoing businesswoman who prosecutors described as “calculating” and “brazen” in seeking someone to kill another woman, the Tampa Bay Times reported.
“It is true these two people exist,” Judge Merryday said Wednesday. “They are actually the same person.”
Stinson pleaded guilty in January to a single charge of murder-for-hire. Prosecutors sought a 9-year sentence, which was on the higher end of the federal sentencing guidelines.
The website, which was not named in court, existed on the “dark web” which is where some people go to buy illegal goods and services in online marketplaces. She admitted to making several transactions last summer on the website, which offered hitman services.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Lisa Thelwell displayed screenshots showing banner photos of a spent shell casing, a man in a hoodie brandishing a handgun and other images.
A pricing page detailed various acts: “Death by shooting,” was listed at a minimum of $5,000, “Death by sniper” was $20,000, and “Beating” was $2,000.
It turns out, the website was a scam. But Stinson, unaware of the scam, made several posts on the website’s public message forum seeking to order a hitman for a “Florida Job,” the newspaper reported.
Records showed she made five bitcoin transactions totaling $12,307.61. She included the intended victim’s name, address and a photo.
The FBI was alerted, interviewed the intended victim and learned of the husband’s previous relationship with Stinson.
An undercover agent contacted Stinson in August, posing as a hitman.
The agent told Stinson, in a recorded phone call that was played in court, that he had been watching the couple. He said he would make it look like a robbery and sought assurances that Stinson wanted to go through with it. She did not back out.
He told her to “act surprised” when she found out.
“Don’t do anything different,” he said. “She’ll be dead within two weeks.”
Stinson was arrested in September.
“I cited the old adage, ‘hell hath no fury like a woman scorned,’” Federal Defender Alec Hall told the judge. “I think that’s what happened in this case.”
Stinson’s parents and friends attended the hearing. They told the judge Stinson held a master’s degree in accounting, ran her own financial services business and served as the chief financial officer for her church.
Stinson apologized in court.
“I wish there was another word for sorry,” she told the court. “I am truly sorry that my brokenness could bring discord to their family.”
Kentucky
Man pleads guilty in 3-state construction scheme
CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — A Kentucky man has pleaded guilty in a construction scheme in three states, officials said.
William Hurst, 44, of Morehead, admitted he agreed to building projects in West Virginia, Ohio and Kentucky, the U.S. attorney’s office for the Southern District of West Virginia said.
Hurst never began the projects or bought any materials, the release said. He admitted receiving more than $35,000 from the customers and eventually stopped communicating with them, the prosecutor’s office said.
Hurst pleaded guilty Wednesday to two counts of wire fraud and is scheduled to be sentenced on July 28. He faces up to 40 years in prison.
Hawaii
Ex-prosecutor’s brother found guilty of dealing drugs
HONOLULU (AP) — The pain physician brother of a former Hawaii prosecutor imprisoned in a corruption case that also took down her former police chief husband was found guilty Wednesday of prescribing oxycodone to his friends so that they could sell the pills for cash.
After a three-week trial, a jury found Dr. Rudolph Puana, 50, guilty of conspiracy to distribute oxycodone and fentanyl and distribution of oxycodone and fentanyl outside the course of professional practice and without a legitimate medical purpose, U.S. prosecutors said.
Some of the money funded cocaine parties with the Big Island doctor, and some of it was used to pay tuition for his friends’ children at one the most expensive private schools in Hawaii, prosecutors said.
“We are, of course, disappointed with the verdict,” Puana’s attorney, F. Clinton Broden, said in an email. “Any discussion of an appeal would be premature at this point.”
Puana’s sister, Katherine Kealoha, pleaded guilty in 2019 to using her position as a deputy prosecutor to protect him from a drug-dealing investigation. She entered the plea after a jury found her and her now-estranged husband guilty of conspiracy in a separate case alleging they plotted to frame a relative to keep him from revealing the fraud that financed their lavish lifestyle.
She is serving a 13-year prison sentence and her husband, Louis Kealoha, is serving a seven-year sentence.
A judge ordered Puana into custody immediately after the verdict. Jurors deliberated for less than a day.
Florida
‘Lizard King’ gets 7 months for trafficking turtles
MIAMI (AP) — A Florida man has been sentenced to seven months in federal prison followed by a year of home confinement for his part in a scheme to smuggle illegally harvested Florida turtles to China, Japan and other places.
Michael Van Nostrand, 55, of Davie, was sentenced Tuesday in Miami federal court, according to court records. He pleaded guilty in November to conspiring to illegally traffic wildlife. Van Nostrand also must pay $100,000 to a congressionally authorized fund that pays for the care, treatment and rehabilitation of wildlife. Van Nostrand’s company, Strictly Reptiles Inc., must pay $150,000 to the same fund.
According to court documents, Van Nostrand and others established a network of “collectors” who searched the Florida wilds for certain freshwater turtle specimens, including the three-stripe mud turtle, from April 2017 through April 2019. The collectors and Van Nostrand then falsely labeled the turtles as having been bred in captivity, rather than caught in the wild, prosecutors said.
Florida banned the commercial catch of turtles in 2009. Prosecutors noted in court filings that significant pressure is being placed on native species, especially turtles and tortoises, throughout the United States to satisfy the black market pet trade and that the U.S. is facing the specter of some species becoming extinct in the wild because of illegal poaching activities.
Van Nostrand gained notoriety through “The Lizard King,” a 2008 bestseller that described a U.S. Fish and Wildlife agent’s yearslong investigation of his business. He was ultimately sentenced to eight months in prison in 1998 for buying smuggled Argentine boas, tegu lizards and other protected wildlife, and required to pay $250,000 to the World Wildlife Fund.
Hawaii
Ex-officer pleads guilty to attempted child enticement
HONOLULU (AP) — A former Maui police officer has pleaded guilty to a federal charge that he offered to pay a 13-year-old girl money for sex.
Brandon Saffeels, 37, pleaded guilty Tuesday to attempted child enticement, the U.S. attorney’s office in Hawaii said.
In December, Saffeels contacted the online profile of what appeared to be a young girl, but was really controlled by a law enforcement officer, prosecutors said.
“Plz don’t judge but im 13,” the undercover officer wrote to Saffeels, who replied “Age is just a number,” and asked for a “sexy pic,” according to court documents.
He offered money for sex with the girl and sent a nude photo of himself, court documents said.
When Saffeels was arrested at a Maui shopping center, he was scheduled to surrender to prison in January to begin a 2 1/2-year sentence in a separate public corruption case for soliciting sex from a woman he pulled over.
He said he offered to help the woman by botching his testimony regarding the 2019 traffic stop. He said he wanted to purse a sexual relationship with her.
Prosecutors said he got her phone number from a police report. When he contacted her, he solicited sexual favors in exchange for helping her circumvent prosecution for drunk driving.
He is scheduled to be sentenced in the enticement case on Sept. 7. According to prosecutors, attempted enticement of a minor carries a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years.
