SDNY COURTHOUSE, June 13 – While many even most cases in the Magistrates Court of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York are sealed, some later go public as full CRIMINAL complaints and are found and reported by Inner City Press, like this one on $1000 a month fraud against the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).
Back on 25 May 2018, SDNY Magistrate Judge Katherine Parker signed a complaint against Etta Yeboah and Joseph Yeboah, including that "JOSEPH YEBOAH submitted a letter falsely stating that he provided $50 per week to cover expenses for his and ETTA YEBOAH's adopted daugther."
Jump cut more than a year forward, and this Federal case has been downgraded to a misdemeandor, by consent to Magistrate Judge Parker, with allegations about sub-letting adding. Inner City Press is as concerned as anyone about fraud and waste. But is this a Federal case, while the heads of the banks which defraud the taxpayers for billions face no charges at all?
Also found by Inner City Press on June 13:Pedro Andres Osorio stands accused of defrauding investors about a "purported liquor distribution company" which, he claimed, "would import liquor from Colombia for resale in the US, including, specifically, a liquore called 'aguardiente," as well as Colombian rum, and that Company-1 had customers in Orlando to whom it sold liquor."
It continues that "the address for the receiving bank is listed as Charlotte, North Carolina." Is that the proposed now "Truist," formed of BB&T and Suntrust? What is the fraud here? Inner City Press will have more on this otherwise unreported case.
On June 12 Alberto Carrasco a/k/a Moreno came through the SDNY Mag Court, charged with agreeing to sell a kilo of heroin in The Bronx.
The Complaint, 19-MAG-5567, has the DEA's Mark Hadzewycz recounting that on June 3 Confidential Source-1 spoke with Carrasco or Moreno then met him on June 5 on Washington Avenue in The Bronx. CS-1 was showing a "six pack" photo array afterward and picked up Moreno. On June 11 on Lorillard Place they met again, agreeing to the sale of heroin in what the complaint calls a Bronx Shopping Center.
Carrasco or Moreno in fact brought the drugs, or a weighed bag, from a "particular multifamily home in Mamaroneck, NY." It was 1.17 kilograms of heroin. He has been detained, with Magistrate Judge Katharine H. Parker writing on the order additional reason: pending order of protection, strength of evidence including results of search of D's premises." His lawyer is CJA Kelly Sharkey; this; his preliminary hearing is set for June 26. Inner City Press,occupied at that time with a rogue cop's sentencing, aims to be there.
The day before on June 11 a man charged with Social Security fraud in Nebraska was brought by U.S. Marshals before Judge Parker, at the end of the day.
Judge Parker's Deputy, following a best practice, read out not only the defendant's name, Colbert, but also a number, 19-MAG-5552. An hour after the proceeding, still nothing. Then the Rule 5(c)(3) affidavit, by Deputy Marshal Eric Kushi. It refers to a criminal case number 19 Cr. 3041.
The defendant has two names: Justin Alexander Colbert, and Nicholas Ryan Hanshaw.
The Assistant U.S. Attorney referred to an order- it sounded like a sealing order, which is done too frequently, but turned out by 8 pm to be UNsealing - drafted by a colleague seemingly Rushmi Bhaskaran, and Judge Parker said whatever it was it would be signed. (To her credit, she did not grant the baseless request to exclude time until Colbert's slated appearance at the Lincoln, Nebraska courthouse on June 26 before a Judge John Gerard.)
Colbert or his family have the funds to travel back for that appearance, and perhaps back to New York after that. His Federal Defender, Ian Marcus Amelkin along with an FD intern arranged for Colbert to get a Metrocard. He was released on his own signature of a $20,000 bond, to be signed by June 25 by his mother as well. And that was it. For now. Inner City Press was the only media in the Mag Court and is continuing to dig into all this. Watch this site, @InnerCityPress and the new @SDNYLIVE.
A defendant was released with reporting "only by phone or web, no home visits" in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York's Magistrates Court as the last case of the week of Magistrate Judge Gabriel W. Gorenstein.
Why could Pre-Trial Services not conduct any home visit? If it it because the defendant - murkily announced as Miguel (Tobias?) Mendez is a cooperating witness, why do it in open court? How to justify remanding some, compared to this?
There is no Miguel Mendez as a defendant in PACER; the Assistant US Attorneys on June 7 were whispering as if part of a conspiracy themselves. Where is the accountability? Where is the transparency?
The next hearing for Bryan Pivnick is July 1. Inner City Press and @SDNYLIVE will be there.
