Businessman Marc Jenson, who is serving time for swindling millions of dollars from investors, claims he has receipts proving that former Utah Attorney Gen. Mark Shurtleff and his successor, John Swallow, accepted expenses on his behalf.“I’m telling you right now: they were extorting me, and they were from the very beginning,” Jenson told the Salt Lake Tribune in an interview from prison. The former businessman was charged with six felonies and was imprisoned after failing to pay $4 million in restitution.Jenson claims that Shurtleff and Swallow pressured him to provide them with costly vacations, meals and other expenses. The current and former attorney generals allegedly promised to help the businessman with his legal troubles in exchange for lavish gifts.The requests allegedly began after Jenson was convicted in 2009, but before he was imprisoned for failing to provide the restitution.Shurtleff and Swallow vacationed at Pelican Hill, an upscale southern California resort where Jenson had his own villa, on multiple occasions. The fraudster says his receipts show both men signing for thousands of dollars worth of food, massages, golf outings, and supplies at the Newport Beach resort.Jenson also claims that Shurtleff forced him to spend $250,000 on a phantom book deal and make consulting payments to a friend of his. Swallow allegedly also demanded a share an upscale $3.5 billion resort that Jenson had planned to establish in Beaver County, Pa.Jenson said he was “scared to death” of the former attorney general and his successor. He says the men told him that if he had donated to Shurtleff’s campaign, they would never have prosecuted him in the first place.But in response to these allegations, which Jenson relayed to the FBI, they denied having ever accepting expenses from the fraudster and claim he is acting out of revenge.”I was responsible for the investigation, conviction and sentencing of Jenson,” Shurtleff told the Tribune. ” … He has sworn revenge. I suggest you consider carefully whether to believe a desperate, convicted fraudster.”Tim Lawson, a close friend of Shurtleff, allegedly also accepted money and ‘gifts’ from Jenson, including a down payment for a piano and $10,000 in cash. But Lawson claims that nothing the fraudster says is true.”Jenson is in prison because he is a pathological liar,” Lawson said, “because he lied to the people he stole money from.”But if the allegations are proven to the true, the news will strike another blow against Swallow, who was last week accused by the head of the state’s Consumer Protection Agency of engaging in inappropriate communications with someone the office planned to file charges against. … Read More
Cop fired for role in Oscar Grant killing charged with fraud
Anthony Pirone was relieved of his job with the Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) Police Department in June 2010 for his role in the death of Oscar Grant III on New Year’s Day 2009. He enlisted with the US Army in May 2011, but authorities say he collected and cashed unemployment checks for around seven months after his full time employment began.Pirone is currently serving a tour in Afghanistan and is not scheduled to return to the US until 2014. When he does, however, he will have to fight accusations of unemployment fraud that were recently filed, the Oakland Tribune reported Friday.On the morning of January 1, 2009, Pirone responded to reports of a fight on a BART train in Oakland. He was the first officer to arrive on the scene and was later accused of escalating an altercation between passengers on an adjacent transit platform that pinnacled with fellow BART cop Johannes Mehserle killing Grant, one of the passengers suspected of brawling onboard the train.During the subsequent murder trial, it was revealed that Pirone apprehended Grant and others suspected of fighting and then ordered them to stand against a wall while he awaited assistance. When Mehserle arrived, Pirone instructed him to place Grant under arrest. According to witness testimonies, Grant resisted attempts to be brought into custody and was eventually wrestled to the floor. Grant was face down on the subway platform being detained by BART officers when Mehserle, apparently mistaking his pistol for his non-lethal Taser, fired a shot and killed him.Pirone testified that he punched Grant in the face while trying to apprehend him and admitted to using a racial epithet during the ordeal.“Why are you fucking with me? You aren’t even real cops,” he said Grant barked at him. Pirone testified in court that Grant called him a “bitch ass nigger,” prompting the officer — who is white — to respond with identical language. He then kneeled on Grants neck and attempted to restrain him seconds before the fatal shot was fired by Mehserle.”Of course he instigated it, he carried an attitude and he pumped up the other officers up in the way he was acting,” Grant’s uncle Cephus Johnson later told Los Angeles’ KGO News of Pirone.Mehserle resigned just days after Grant’s death, but Pirone’s termination didn’t come until April of the following year, despite pleas from community members and activists to remove him from the force. When Pirone was relieved of his job, Grant family attorney John Burris told the San Francisco Gate, “It’s about time.””But for Pirone’s misconduct, Oscar Grant would not be dead,” Burris said. “When you combine all of the facts, what you have is an out-of-control officer who escalated the event into a situation where a young man was killed.”One month later Mehserle pleaded not guilty to charges of second-degree murder and voluntary manslaughter, and was subsequently convicted of involuntary manslaughter by a jury. He served only 11 months, and less than a year after his release he unsuccessfully requested he be readmitted to the force.Pirone distanced himself from the case after losing his job in April 2011 and relocated to North Carolina to join the Army two years ago this month. Once he returns from deployment, however, legal woes will likely once again return.According to the Tribune, Pirone cashed unemployment checks from May 2011 through December of that year, even though he had already enlisted and begun work at Fort Bragg Army Base nearly 3,000 miles from the nearest BART train.No details have been released yet as to when Pirone was deployed to his current tour in Afghanistan, but investigators tell the Tribune that he lied at least 10 times on sworn affidavits that he was unemployed while actually earning a paycheck from Uncle Sam.The Tribune has not learned the amount that Pirone is accused of stealing, but prior to his termination from the BART Police Department he was earning a reported $100,000 annual salary. Before joining the force, he spent more than a decade as military officer with the Marine Corps.Charges against Pirone were filed on April 15, although information was not publicized until this Friday. … Read More
High schooler arrested for making “terrorist threat” in YouTube rap
A high schooler outside of Boston has been arrested for announcing plans on Facebook that could be interpreted as trying to one-up the devastation of the Boston Marathon bombings.Cameron Dambrosio, 18, of Methuen, Mass.—30 miles from Boston—is being held on $1 million bail.As reported by the Eagle-Tribune, Methuen Police Chief Joseph Solomon said Dambrosio posted “(Expletive) the Boston bombing, wait til you see what I do. I’m going to be famous,” to Facebook.”He’s telling people to shut up and in order to get some props he’ll have to go kill somebody. He says he’ll go insane and make the news,” Solomon added. “And he said people shouldn’t cry when they see what he does because they have it coming.”Continue Reading… … Read More
Fourteen-year-old’s iPad and piggy bank stolen by woman he hired for sex
Police in Prospect Heights, Illinois arrested a Milwaukee woman Thursday who allegedly pepper sprayed and robbed a 14-year-old boy who tried to hire her for sex. According to the Chicago Tribune, 22-year-old Dareka R. Brooks is set to be arraigned in Cook County Circuit Court on Friday on charges…
Activists protest Boeing annual shareholder meeting in latest of many anti-drone demonstrations
Recently there have been many anti-drone demonstrations across the United States and around the world, with the latest at Boeing’s annual shareholder meeting in Chicago. … Read More
O’Connor: Maybe SCOTUS shouldn’t have ruled on Bush v. Gore
Former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor said last week that in retrospect, perhaps the Supreme Court should not have elected to rule on Bush v. Gore, the 2000 decision that ended the Florida recount in the presidential race.”It took the case and decided it at a time when it was still a big election issue,” she told the Chicago Tribune editorial board in an interview on Friday. “Maybe the court should have said, ‘We’re not going to take it, goodbye.’”From the Tribune:The case, she said, “stirred up the public” and “gave the court a less-than-perfect reputation.” “Obviously the court did reach a decision and thought it had to reach a decision,” she said. “It turned out the election authorities in Florida hadn’t done a real good job there and kind of messed it up. And probably the Supreme Court added to the problem at the end of the day.”Continue Reading… … Read More
Former high school jock takes probation on charges of penis-slapping teammates
A 19-year-old Minnesota man was put on 10 years of probation for an incident in which he “penis slapped” his high school teammates and exposed himself to 11- and 12-year-old boys. The Minneapolis Star-Tribune reported on Tuesday that Seth Kellen is also likely to be sentenced to 30 days…
