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Could this be true? Several sources as well as several of our commenters tell us that both Veldora Arthur and Thomas Thelusma have been on paid administrative leave since they were federally indicted for mortgage fraud! From our comments section...
Anonymous said...
While I don't agree with the "black thing" comment, the rest is very troubling if true. As we've said time and time again, we believe in the presumption of innocence, innocent till proven guilty, but this business of getting federally indicted and then being put on paid administrative leave is a bit much, isn't it?
What's even more troubling is the fact that the cops indicted in operation "Cop out" aka the Plantation cops mortgage fraud case were put on "leave" without pay after they were indicted. Why did the cops get sent home with no money while having to prove their innocence while the City of Miami fire department employees get to stay home while still raking in six figures? Worse still, with the City of Miami teetering on the verge of bankruptcy, how the hell can they justify paying these federally indicted employees while they're sitting at home? Can we really afford to have anyone sitting at home while getting paid as if they were at work?
Now, going back to the Plantation Cops mortgage fraud case, aka "Operation Cop out", we learned yesterday that the decision to go after the cops was made by FDLE special agent Dennis Roadruck...
In the spoilation hearing before this court Lead Agent Dennis Roadruck testified that he in his sole disgression limited this investigation to the cops.
I wonder what it was about the cops that caused agent Roadruck to focus his attention on them and them alone? We've been told time and time again throughout the course of this investigation and subsequent trial that the mortgage brokers involved, Rene Rodriguez and Matt Gulla, had committed hundreds if not thousands of similar frauds. Even worse, the government was not only aware of these other cases of fraud but they also had the mortgage brokers records and hard drives which contained proof of these frauds, so why did this investigation only zero in on the cops that were indicted?
You guys hash it out and we'll discuss further next time.
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Yesterday we discussed the allegations of prosecutorial misconduct by the government during the grand jury proceedings which led up to the Plantation cops mortgage fraud indictment. Specifically it's alleged that the government lied to the grand jury when they claimed that the subjects misrepresented facts on HUD-1 forms that were submitted to a Government agency, the Department of Housing & Urban Development. Our contention is that this is patently false as these loans were neither FHA loans or loans that were underwritten by the government therefore making the prosecutors allegations of "submitting false information to a government agency" an outright lie.
As shocking as these allegations of prosecutorial misconduct before the grand jury were, I was even more startled at the prosecutors response to the allegations, take a look for yourselves...
Governments Response to Steven Stolls Motion to Dismiss
I find this bit the most disturbing...
II. ANY PURPORTED ERROR IS RENDERED HARMLESS BY THE PETIT JURY
Any purported errors claimed by the Defendant are rendered harmless if the petit jury convicts the defendant. See United States v. Mechanik, 475 U.S. 66, 72-73 (1986).
Based on the aforementioned argument and facts, the counts in the Indictment should stand and the defendant can be tried on the merits. "An indictment returned by a legally constituted and unbiased grand jury, . . . if valid on its face, is enough to call for trial of the charge on the merits." Costello, 350 U.S. at 363.
Really? So the government says disregard the fact that we may have made a horrific mistake (perhaps intentionally) when we convinced the grand jury to indict, now since we're in front of another jury, let them figure it out? If the "petit jury" convicts, the errors we made are harmless? How about taking into consideration that if you didn't make these "purported errors" the grand jury may not have indicted the poor schleps that are now before the "petit jury"?
I can only imagine the rage the defendants must have felt when reading this motion. Oh well, like the government says, fuck it, let the jury figure it out...
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We left off last week discussing certain excerpts from the grand jury transcript from the Plantation Cop's mortgage fraud case, let's take another look at those excerpts...
With respect to this particular Indictment, we’re talking about the first count, which is a conspiracy count. It’s a conspiracy to commit mail fraud, wire fraud, and filing of false statement with a Government agency, the Department of Housing & Urban Development.
Filing a false statement with a government agency, specifically the Department of Housing & Urban Development? The loans in question weren't FHA or government insured, so why in the world would anyone think that the HUD-1's for the loans in question were filed with HUD?
In case there was any confusion, the prosecutors presented the grand jury with testimony from one of the agents working the case who confirmed that indeed the HUD-1's in question were filed with the Department of Housing & Urban Development...
Q. And the department or agency to which the HUD-1 is submitted is the Department of Housing & Urban Development?
A. Yes.
Isn't that nice? The obvious problem with these statements is that their flat out WRONG! The prosecutor presenting the case to the grand jury knows so little about the intricacies of mortgage and real estate transactions that he makes this obvious misrepresentation, to add insult to injury he brings in an agent to testify who knows just as little about the subject at hand as he does. Fabulous.
Here's something else to consider, could it be possible since grand jury proceedings are secret, that the prosecutor took some liberties with the truth? Take a look at the same two excerpts from the grand jury transcripts, this time without the obvious misrepresentations...
With respect to this particular Indictment, we’re talking about the first count, which is a conspiracy count. It’s a conspiracy to commit mail fraud, wire fraud, and filing of false statement with a Government agency, the Department of Housing & Urban Development lender.
And...
Q. And the department or agency to which the HUD-1 is submitted is the Department of Housing & Urban Development lender?
A. Yes.
Doesn't that sound completely different? Somehow allegedly lying to a lender (or bank) sounds less damning than lying to a "government agency, the Department of Housing & Urban Development". The question that remains is why would the prosecutor and the case agent in question lie to the grand jury? Was the case too weak to go forward based on the truth? Did the prosecutors need this extra bit of "spice" to push the grand jury to indict or could the prosecutors and agents who worked the case actually know so little about the case that they were prosecuting that they made an innocent mistake? I doubt it. I'm more inclined to believe that this misrepresentation of the facts was designed solely to paint the subjects of the indictment in as bad of light as possible before the grand jury in order to guarantee an indictment. Simply saying the defendants lied to bank wasn't strong enough but alleging that they committed wire and mail fraud by lying to a government agency is a whole different animal.
The worst part of all this? All the grand jury proceedings are secret. More tomorrow.
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Why not? If the truth isn't good enough, why not make up some bullshit to really get the job done? Say your a cop or a prosecutor who's itching to put a case together but can't close the deal, somehow you need that extra little bit of spice to push it over the edge to make your allegations more convincing. We witnessed Miami Dade Prosecutor Bill Kostrzewski do it several times, whether lying to a judge or to a witness to elicit the testimony he needed to help his case, as we said the other day, how about if you go one step further and lie to a grand jury in ordrer to get an indictment?
Take a look at these exceprts from the grand jury transcripts for the Plantation Cop's mortgage fraud case aka "Operation Copout"...
With respect to this particular Indictment, we’re talking about the first count, which is a conspiracy count. It’s a conspiracy to commit mail fraud, wire fraud, and filing of false statement with a Government agency, the Department of Housing & Urban Development.
Oh really?
Counts 2 through 12 are the mail fraud counts. Counts 13 through 25 are the wire fraud counts. Counts 26 through 33 are the 1001 counts, which is the filing of a false statement with a federal agency.
No kidding? Here's a snippet of the testimony from the agent who put together the case...
Q. And the department or agency to which the HUD-1 is submitted is the Department of Housing & Urban Development?
A. Yes.
Anyone see the problem there? Think it over and we'll discuss in detail tomorrow...
