Month: March 2023

Source: United States Department of Justice News

The Justice Department’s Servicemembers and Veterans Initiative convened a virtual listening session today with representatives from organizations serving veterans. The listening session was part of the Civil Rights Division’s celebration of Black History Month. The discussion focused on issues faced by Black veterans, particularly in the transition from military to civilian life, and the programs and resources available to help them. The meeting participants also discussed the civil legal needs of veterans with regard to access to veteran benefits, housing, homelessness and child custody.

Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Kristen Clarke welcomed the participants and described the Division’s role in protecting servicemembers and veterans from discrimination and unfair treatment. Other Justice Department attendees included representatives from the Office for Access to Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Justice Management Division and Executive Office of U.S. Attorneys.

Representatives of organizations serving veterans also participated in the discussion. They include, among others, the American Legion, the Military Officers Association of America, the National Association of Black Military Women, the Connecticut Veterans Legal Center and several law school veteran legal services clinics. 

The Servicemember and Veterans Initiative, housed in the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, works to ensure that the rights of the brave men and women of our Nation’s armed forces, and the veterans who have served in the past, are safeguarded from discrimination and unfair treatment. To learn more about the Justice Department’s Servicemember and Veterans Initiative, please visit Servicemembers and Veterans Initiative (justice.gov). To learn more about the Justice Department’s Office for Access to Justice, please visit Office for Access to Justice.

Source: United States Department of Justice News

Damian Williams, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced that TRACII SHOW HUTSONA was sentenced today to 51 months in prison for her embezzlement of more than one million dollars as part of a confidence scheme.  The sentence was imposed by U.S. District Judge Jesse M. Furman.

U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said: “Not long after serving a lengthy sentence for a previous federal conviction, Tracii Show Hutsona betrayed her employer’s trust by misusing her employer’s financial information to fund her own luxury lifestyle for years.  Her desire to live the high life at the expense of her victim has placed her back where she began — facing another substantial federal sentence.”

According to public court filings and statements made in Court:     

Between October 2015 and November 2019, SHOW HUTSONA engaged in a confidence scheme to embezzle over a million dollars from a victim (the “Victim”).  The Victim hired SHOW HUTSONA to serve as a personal assistant at the Victim’s home and trusted SHOW HUTSONA with access to the Victim’s financial information.  Just a few months after she was hired, and while SHOW HUTSONA was on supervised release in connection with a previous federal fraud conviction in California, SHOW HUTSONA began using that access to finance her own luxury lifestyle. 

In February 2016, SHOW HUTSONA opened a credit card account in the Victim’s name without the Victim’s knowledge or authorization.  In September 2018, after the Victim learned about significant expenditures from the Victim’s financial accounts, the Victim confronted SHOW HUTSONA, who confessed that she had used the Victim’s financial accounts for her own personal use and repeatedly apologized to the Victim.  Shortly thereafter, SHOW HUTSONA and the Victim signed an agreement, which stated, among other things, that SHOW HUTSONA had obtained an “additional user card” (the “User Card”) and that SHOW HUTSONA “had been using [the Victim’s] account since July 2016.”  The agreement further stated that SHOW HUTSONA needed to repay $307,498.02 to the Victim.  Having regained the Victim’s trust, in the days and months after executing the agreement with the Victim, SHOW HUTSONA continued to use the Victim’s financial accounts without permission, including through use of the User Card, which SHOW HUTSONA had represented to the Victim had been destroyed. 

In September 2019, the Victim terminated her relationship with SHOW HUTSONA after discovering additional unauthorized charges made by SHOW HUTSONA.  The Victim reported fraudulent expenditures on the Victim’s financial accounts to her bank.  During the bank’s subsequent investigation, SHOW HUTSONA faxed the bank a fraudulent “Power of Attorney” document (the “Power of Attorney”), which appeared to be signed by the Victim and notarized.  The Power of Attorney stated that SHOW HUTSONA would serve as the Victim’s “attorney-in-fact” and have control over the Victim’s “Banking and other financial institution transactions.”  In fact, the Victim did not provide SHOW HUTSONA with any such power of attorney, the Victim did not sign the document, and the notary did not notarize it. 

During the scheme, SHOW HUTSONA, without authorization, added herself as an additional account holder to at least two checking accounts and a savings account maintained by the Victim and obtained multiple credit cards in her own name but drawn on accounts of the Victim (collectively, the “Fraud Accounts”).  Over the course of approximately four years, SHOW HUTSONA used the Fraud Accounts to steal over $1 million from the Victim.  SHOW HUTSONA used the proceeds of her fraud scheme to make payments to SHOW HUTSONA’s concierge business and for personal expenses, such as mobile phones, restaurants and nightclubs, luxury hotels, and jewelry.  To cover the purchases, SHOW HUTSONA transferred hundreds of thousands of dollars into the Fraud Accounts from a checking account of the Victim and two 529 college savings accounts maintained by the Victim on behalf of the Victim’s children. 

*                *                *

In addition to her prison term, SHOW HUTSONA, 54, of Scottsdale, Arizona, was sentenced to three years of supervised release.  She was further ordered to forfeit $1,148,759.28 and to pay restitution in the amount of $1,148,759.28.

Mr. Williams praised the outstanding investigative work of the United States Secret Service and the New York City Police Department.  

The prosecution of this case is being handled by the Office’s Complex Frauds and Cybercrime Unit.  Assistant U.S. Attorney Timothy V. Capozzi is in charge of the prosecution.

Source: United States Department of Justice News

            WASHINGTON – Jason Tipton, 36, of Washington, D.C., was sentenced today to seven years in prison for distribution of child pornography. Tipton pleaded guilty on October 11, 2022.

            According to court documents, after identifying Tipton, law enforcement arrested him in April 2020. During execution of a search warrant at his residence, various digital devices were seized. The partial extraction of his cellphone revealed a series of hyperlinks in a “Notes” section on the phone.  A subsequent search of the defendant’s iCloud account revealed these same hyperlinks, which contained over 200 videos depicting the sexual abuse of very young children.  Several of these videos depict victims known to law enforcement, who have been identified by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children as victims depicted in series of child sexual abuse material that is widely traded. The defendant admitted that he had several KIK accounts, all of which he deleted, that he used to trade images depicting the sexual abuse of young children. He admitted to sending pictures of a child relative to strangers that he met over the internet, who had expressed a sexual attraction to children. He admitted that he took pictures of a child sleeping and that he sent those pictures to other individuals he met online. 

            In addition to the prison term, U.S. District Court Judge Trevor N. McFadden ordered $21,000 in restitution to the victim, 10 years of supervised release, and ordered Tipton to register as a sex offender for 25 years.

            This case was investigated by the FBI Washington Field Office’s Child Exploitation and Human Trafficking Task Force. The task force is composed of FBI agents, along with other federal agents and detectives from northern Virginia and the District of Columbia. The task force is charged with investigating and bringing federal charges against individuals engaged in the exploitation of children and those engaged in human trafficking.

            In announcing the sentence, U.S. Attorney Matthew M. Graves, FBI Special Agent in Charge Wayne Jacobs, of the Washington Field Office’s Criminal and Cyber Division, and Chief Robert J. Contee, III, of the Metropolitan Police Department commended the work of the FBI agents and MPD detectives. They also expressed appreciation to those who worked on the case from the U.S. Attorney’s Office Victim/Witness Advocate Yvonne Bryant, and Assistant U.S. Attorney Amy Larson, who investigated and prosecuted the case.

            This case was brought as part of the Department of Justice’s Project Safe Childhood initiative and investigated by the FBI’s Child Exploitation Task Force, which includes members of the FBI’s Washington Field Office and MPD. In February 2006, the Attorney General created Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative designed to protect children from online exploitation and abuse. Led by the U.S. Attorney’s Offices, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state, and local resources to better locate, apprehend, and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.projectsafechildhood.gov.

Source: United States Department of Justice News

TULSA, Okla. – A Tulsan who sexually abused a young child for approximately one year was sentenced Monday in federal court, announced U.S. Attorney Clint Johnson. U.S. District Judge Jack Zouhary sentenced Robert William Perry II, 32, to life in federal prison. In May, Perry was found guilty at trial for aggravated sexual abuse of a minor in Indian Country and for abusive sexual contact of a minor in Indian Country.

Source: United States Department of Justice News

This week, as part of the continued work by the Department of Justice and the Department of the Interior to implement the Not Invisible Act and combat the crisis of Missing and Murdered Indigenous People (MMIP), Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco and Secretary Deb Haaland hosted the first in-person plenary session of the Not Invisible Act Commission at the U.S. Department of the Interior in Washington, D.C. The two-day meeting follows a series of online sessions since the establishment of the Commission last year.

The Not Invisible Act, which was authored by then-Rep. Haaland and passed into law in October 2020, established the Commission as a cross jurisdictional advisory committee composed of both federal and non-federal members including law enforcement, Tribal leaders, federal partners, service providers, family members of missing and murdered individuals, and survivors. Deputy Attorney General Monaco and Secretary Deb Haaland announced the members of the Commission last year as part of a live event to recognize National MMIP Awareness Day on May 5.

Deputy Attorney General Monaco reported that after hearing from Tribal representatives and subject-matter experts during consultations, the Department of Justice was successful in its efforts to secure more Indian country law enforcement resources to address the crisis of missing or murdered Indigenous People in fiscal year 2023. The Deputy Attorney General also stressed the Department’s commitment to doing everything in its power to offer support and partnership to the Commission as it develops and finalizes its recommendations.

“The Justice Department is steadfast in our pledge to work with Tribal governments in preventing and responding to the violence that has disproportionately harmed Tribal communities. And we are committed to listening and being responsive to what our partners have to say,” said Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco. “We are eager to receive the recommendations of this group of experts.”    

“This work requires each of us to face our own trauma, to relive unimaginable pain, and visualize a future in which our loved ones are safe and our communities have closure. We’re here for our children, grandchildren and relatives we have yet to meet,” said Secretary Deb Haaland. “This work is urgently needed and requires all of us working collaboratively. I am so grateful to the Commission for the work they are doing and the lasting impact they will have.”

The Commission is developing recommendations through the work of six subcommittees focused on improving intergovernmental coordination and establishing best practices for state, Tribal and federal law enforcement to bolster resources for survivors and victim’s families, and combatting the epidemic of missing persons, murder and trafficking of American Indian and Alaska Native peoples, as specified under the law.

As part of the Commission’s final report to Attorney General Merrick B. Garland, Secretary Deb Haaland and Congress, the subcommittees selected specific locations to hold field hearings this year to hear directly from the public in some of the communities most affected by the MMIP crisis:

April:

• Tulsa, Oklahoma
• Anchorage, Alaska

May:

• Flagstaff, Arizona

June:

• Minneapolis, Minnesota
• Northern California
• Albuquerque, New Mexico

July:

• Billings, Montana

* A national, virtual field hearing will be held later in Summer 2023 with details to follow.

Hearings will include both panel discussions and a public comment period. Specific topics of the hearings as well as logistical details and information will be made available to the public as the date of each hearing approaches. Trauma-informed mental health professionals will be available at each location.