False arrests
Trooper of the year in Salt Lake City, Utah is now up against a lawsuit for false DUI charges for over 1500 people. Lisa Steed had made over 400 arrests in 2009 beating out most of the state of Utah and receiving recognition from the state, but I guess she pulled a fast one over everyone’s heads. Now, many who were arrested by the hands of Steed are coming forward to complain of the charges that were raised against them.
De-friended!
There’s a pretty good chance that Mark Zuckerberg had already de-friended Paul Ceglia. In a recent decision, Ceglia has officially been indicted after faking evidence against Facebook creator Mark Zuckerberg. The original lawsuit, which came about in 2010, stems from the fact that in 2003, Ceglia altered contracts co-signed by Zuckerberg in an attempt to give himself 50% share of the company. Authorities had arrested the internet entrepreneur in October on charges centered around issues relating to the lawsuit. Ceglia was guilty of mail fraud, wire fraud, and also attempts at tampering with and destroying evidence. He currently faces up to 20 years in jail per criminal charge. Read more
Hung out to dry
Rabbi Mordchai Fish, of Brooklyn, New York, has been sentenced to 46 months in prison for laundering nearly a million dollars. In early 2008, Fish accepted checks to charities in New York and New Jersey from admitted Ponzi schemer and FBI informant Solomon Dwek. The charities, including Boyoner Gemilas Chesed, Beth Pinchas, and Levovous, are called “gemachs”, groups intended to give money to people in need. Instead, the cash went straight back to Dwek, freshly laundered, with Fish keeping a nice 10% commission for himself in the process. Too bad Dwek was wired up and handing Fish bait money provided by the FBI. Over two years, Fish and Dwek, with the latter informing all the while, laundered more than $900,000, a crime punishable by a maximum 20 years in prison and fines up to $200,000. Fish swam by the recommended 57-month sentence from Judge Joel Pisano, receiving a lower sentence because of his work in the Orthodox community.
TV turnaround
Comebacks can be costly. Melissa Joan Hart starred in a couple of hit TV shows in her career, Clarissa Explains It All (1991-1994) and Sabrina the Teenage Witch (1996-2003), both aimed at the teenage demographic. After that, she wasn’t quite so young anymore (just 15 at the start of Clarissa, surprisingly), and thus wasn’t the best choice to sell TV shows to said demographic anymore. Consequently, her acting career sort of floundered in the years post-Sabrina. Sometime in 2006 and shortly after the birth of her first son, Hart hired talent manager Kieran Maguire to help bump her up to the lucrative 25-to-36 demographic and win back her bygone star power. This tactic turned out to be successful: in 2010, Hart premiered her TV show Melissa and Joey, a family sitcom about parents and motherhood and raising kids and junk. (Aside: That I, a 23-year-old male, have no interest in watching the show is testament to its intended marketing segment.) Nevertheless, things were looking good for Mrs. Hart in her successful transition from teenage idol to sitcom matron.
Justice
Remember the landmark $25 billion federal foreclosure settlement from February? The one which has provisions to help prevent foreclosure on homeowners, provisions most states are ignoring? Which doesn’t yet seem to be doing much for foreclosure victims at all? Well, at least one person has benefited from the settlement: the whistleblower who drew the curtains back on the wizards at Countrywide Financial to kick off the case in the first place. Kyle Lagow, who was fired for pointing out illegalities in Countrywide’s foreclosure appraisal business, first brought the situation to the government’s attention with a lawsuit in 2008. That particular lawsuit, which rolled into one huge suit with a bunch of similar ones, was eventually settled for $1 billion. Whistleblower laws entitle a citizen who first brings up a case and turns over evidence to a certain percentage of the money eventually won in that case. In Lagow’s case, that amount is $14.5 million. Not bad for a lowly house appraiser.