Articles Posted in Theft Crimes

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A 24-year-old Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary has pleaded not guilty to charges of unlawful wiretap and breaking and entering in the daytime with intent to commit a felony. Daniel G. Richards was arrested on Sunday.

Richards is accused of breaking into another student’s dorm room and videotaping her without her consent. The female student reported the incident last July after discovering a video recording device in her room. She claimed that someone broke in.

Richards, who has been suspended indefinitely from the school and was ordered to move out of his dorm, is scheduled to appear in court for a pre-trial hearing at the end of next month.

In Massachusetts, a conviction for breaking and entering with intent to commit a felony can land a defendant in jail for up to 20 years. Other consequences can include suspension from school, loss of scholarship opportunities, having your applications for professional licenses denied, denial of US citizenship if you are an immigrant, loss of career opportunities, and the revocation of certain civil rights.

There are ways to combat a breaking and entering charge.

Other kinds of Massachusetts breaking and entering offenses:
• Breaking and entering with intent to commit a misdemeanor
• Breaking and entering in the nighttime with intent to commit a felony • Entering without breaking in the nighttime • Entry without breaking into a dwelling in the nighttime with intent to commit a felony
Seminary student charged with secretly filming classmate, Boston Herald, August 31, 2010
Theological student charged with videotaping female student, WBZ, August 31, 2010

Related Web Resource:
General Laws of Massachusetts
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Big happenings in the Boston area! A police investigation into a robbery with a gun! What could be more exciting than a big SWAT team operation? The Bad Guys are usually cornered and lives hang in the balance as the Good Guys take control and take whatever Bad Guys still exist after the stand-off into custody.

Such was the scene at Fenwood Road in Mission Hill yesterday.

Well, almost.

It was a tense four hours last night as the investigating Boston Police Department special operations team and dozens of police units surrounded the apartment at issue.

The targets?

Armed robbery suspects! Pretty serious stuff!
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Luther M. Henderson has been arraigned on charges of Brockton, Massachusetts armed kidnapping, armed robbery, and witness intimidation. The 35-year-old man is accused of robbing a female escort that he had contacted through Craiglist at gunpoint.

On July 9, Henderson allegedly offered to pay her for her sexual services. At the house where they were to meet, he allegedly held her at gunpoint, told her to take her clothes off, made her put on zip-cuffs, and stole her money, laptop, purse, and cellphone from her car.

Henderson is also under investigation in connection to another Massachusetts armed robbery crime, also involving an escort contacted through Craigslist. The woman was also told to take off her clothes before her kidnapper stole from her.

Massachusetts Kidnapping
The crime of kidnapping in Massachusetts involves the illegal and forcible imprisonment of someone against his or her will. The kidnapping can occur within the state or involve taking someone out of state. A conviction for Massachusetts kidnapping comes with a maximum 10-year prison sentence-15 years, if the victim is younger than 16. A conviction for armed kidnapping comes with a mandatory 2 ½ year sentence if the case goes through the district courts. If it goes through the superior courts, then conviction comes with a 10-year prison sentence. Kidnapping another person with the intention of extorting money comes with a maximum sentence of life in prison.

Craigslist Escorts are Robbed, Boston.com, August 14, 2010
Brockton man accused of making Craigslist escorts strip naked at gunpoint before robbing them, Patriot Ledger, August 13, 2010

Related Web Resources:
CraigsList Massachusetts

The General Laws of Massachusetts
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Sometimes, you find a case that seems to reveal a new low in criminal acts. As a Boston criminal defense attorney for many years, I have seen more than my fill.

Allegedly, that is.

A Brighton man was arrested Monday night for allegedly robbing a 67-year-old woman who uses a wheelchair for mobility purposes, according to police officials.

Jerdon B, 48, (hereinafter, the “Defendant”) is said gentleman. At about 11:40p.m., officers responded to the Mission Hill neighborhood to investigate the event.
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The Defendant was charged with unarmed robbery for allegedly robbing the complainant while she was waiting for the Green Line trolley, police said. The suspect then allegedly pushed her onto the tracks on Huntington Avenue.

His reward? Ten bucks.
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The Boston Criminal Lawyer Blog has been discussing school campus related crimes of late. Most of these have had to do with the subject of bullying, a topic I just know we will be returning to. Yesterday, we briefly discussed a different kind of criminal behavior by a student. This one is a bit less sympathetic.

The story hails from the home of Altman & Altman LLP’s main office…Cambridge. It involves the legendary Harvard University and an ex-student who allegedly took the subjects of creative writing and social science and twisted them into a pretzel of deceit and larceny. It features the allegations against the former student with contradictory credentials, Adam B. Wheeler…perhaps a young Bernard Madoff in the making.

As you probably have heard, young Mr. Wheeler is facing a plethora of criminal charges and there may be more to come. The 20 indictments against him reflect a successful scheme to bilk Harvard University out of approximately $45,000 through a series of white collar crimes. He is alleged to have falsified documents, plagiarized and lied in order to gain acceptance into Harvard, gain scholarships, win prizes and get a grant.

In fact, should the allegations contain a cyber-fraud element crossing state boundries, which is likely, Young Wheeler could be looking at federal charges as well as those he faces by the Commonwealth.

Of course, now that the news has broken and he has pleaded “Not Guilty”, the ignited debate rages on. Everyone is trying to explain who the young gentleman is and how he did what he (allegedly) did.

For example, a former high school classmate claims that the lad was a class clown who delighted in pranks such as tossing ketchup packets around the halls like little red landmines. Further, she doubts anyone expected him capable of the complex scam that prosecutors say he pulled on some of America’s best brains in Harvard University’s hallowed halls.
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Adam B. Wheeler, a former Harvard student who has been indicted for falsifying information that allowed him to get into the university and receive thousands of dollars in financial aid and grants, has pleaded not guilty to 20 criminal counts of identify fraud, larceny, pretending to hold a degree, and falsifying an endorsement or approval. At the 23-year-old’s arraignment today, his cash bail was set at $5,000. If convicted, Wheeler could be sentenced to a maximum of five years in prison for each felony count and a year for each misdemeanor.

Wheeler is accused of submitting bogus transcripts that showed him attending Phillips Academy and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He also allegedly falsified his perfect SAT test score of 1600 and included fake letters of recommendation with his college application.

Assistant Middlesex District Attorney John Verner says that in fact, Wheeler had actually attended a Delaware high school, earned 1100 on his SAT, and was studying a Bowdoin College before he was suspended for plagiarizing an essay. He then applied to transfer to Harvard after the Spring 2007 semester.

Prosecutors claim that Wheeler plagiarized letters of recommendation and essays and made other allegedly “untruthful” statements when applying for Fulbright and Rhodes Scholarships. They claim that he defrauded Harvard of more than $45,000, including $31,806 in financial aid, $6,000 in English prizes, and $8,000 for a research grant.

It was when he applied for the Rhodes and Fulbright Scholarships in September 2009 that a Harvard professor began to suspect that Wheeler had committed plagiarism. Wheeler then decided to leave Harvard. He is also accused of submitting fraudulent documents, including fake letters of recommendation, to Brown and Yale when he submitted transfer applications to both schools.

Wheeler’s Cambridge criminal defense lawyer says that it is important to remember that the charges against his client are “just allegations” and that Wheeler should be “presumed innocent” until proven guilty. This is the 23-year-old’s first brush with the law.

Parents stepped in after alleged Harvard scammer applied to Yale, Boston.com, May 18, 2010
Ex-Harvard Student, Adam Wheeler, Pleads Not Guilty to Charges of Fabricating Academic History, The Harvard Crmson, May 18, 2010

Related Web Resource:
Harvard University
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Yesterday, I had to go to a local Massachusetts Registry of Motor Vehicles. Now, I am a lawyer. I have some idea of how some of these things should work. I am also somewhat knowledgeable about the system, bureaucracy and red tape, including how simple things can be made very unsimple. The result? I walked out about 2 hours later (the ticket I was handed said I would be seen in 8 minutes) and with my goal still not reached. Not only that, but this inconvenience resulted in the first time I saw the clerk perform what I took to beng the closest she ever came to a smile.

What can one do? Well, today I can take the small step of delivering a blog about the RMV!

Well, sort of.

I direct your attention to Framingham, where sits a Middlesex grand jury which has returned indictments recently against Mr. Ahmed S., 30, (hereinafter, the “Defendant”). He had been arrested a month earlier due to an investigation which apparently revealed that he was falsifying drivers’ licenses, the AG’s office said.
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Today, the Boston Criminal Lawyer Blog points out that there really can be “heroes” as well as “villains” in today’s modern, if not skeptical, age.

It seems to also be a story of a suspect’s alleged consistency.

It was this past Monday. It began when a 34-year-old woman parked her Acura SUV at the Dock Square garage in the North End. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a burly man appeared at her door, speaking calmly and matter-of-factly.

“I need your car, I need your keys,” he said.

When she saw the gun in her hand, she knew it was not simply an unlucky gentleman who simply needed an emergency ride to, say, deliver a baby.

He simply wanted to deliver the car…to himself
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Message from a Boston criminal defense attorney to Ms. Kimberly J., 38 (hereinafter, the :Defendant”) – it is not as bad as you think.

It is actually worse.

The Defendant had been wanted by Massachusetts law enforcement in the alleged kidnapping Thursday of her half-sister’s one-year-old daughter. She has been apprehended in Altona, Pennsilvania and immediately arrested by investigating officers. The Defendant had been staying at a women’s shelter where she is said to have been using an alias and a stolen I.D.

Lest you think she is inconsistent, though, she was also allegedly driving a stolen vehicle .

The one that was apparently used in the abduction.
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George P., a 48-year-old man from Medford, (hereinafter, the “Defendant”), has been indicted by a Suffolk County Grand Jury in Boston. This means that if he has a court-appointed lawyer, he or she had best be “superior court certified”. Somehow, though, given the charges…the Department of Probation may not find him indigent.

He is charged with stealing millions of dollars from former employers and covering those thefts by overbilling his clients. Specifically, the charge is four counts of larceny over $250 and procurement fraud. When he was arraigned in district court in December, he was released on $25,000 bail. He is scheduled to be arraigned in superior court later this month.

Unbeknownst to the Defendant, the attorney general’s office had been investigating him for months. They were looking into his actions while under the employment of two construction management companies. The Commonwealth claims that, while serving as vice president of a company in the Greater Boston area, he “routinely submitted reimbursement requests that contained fake receipts, invoices, and correspondence.”

The company allegedly relied on the Defendant’s documentation and paid him several million dollars in reimbursements from 2007 until his departure in January 2009.
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