Utah
Coin salesman sentenced to 19 years for silver Ponzi scheme
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — An antique coin salesman who pled guilty to money laundering and fraud charges stemming from a $200 million silver trading scheme was sentenced to 19 years in prison on Tuesday in what a federal judge called one of the largest Ponzi schemes in Utah history.
U.S. District Court Judge Ted Stewart handed out the full 19-year sentence requested by prosecutors to Gaylen Rust, FOX-13 reported.
Gaylen Rust pled guilty to soliciting funds at his family business, Rust Rare Coin, for a silver trading program and for years paying out money from new investors to old ones to create an impression that the investment was profitable and keep the scheme going.
He ultimately pled guilty to using the money to fund purchases including a $2 million home, racehorses and donations to various charities.
“There was no silver,” said Assistant U.S. attorney Jacob Strain. “There was no trading, and there was no program. It was just taking money in and paying money out to investors to get the appearance of profitability.”
A court-appointed receiver is liquidating the Rusts’ assets, however FOX 13 reports that it’s unlikely Rust will be able to pay out the $153 million in court-ordered restitution.
California
Appeals court says protesters can sue over Vegas arrests
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A federal appeals court ruled Tuesday that a Las Vegas police detective can be sued for arresting protesters who chalked anti-police slogans on the sidewalk in front of the police station.
Three activists arrested in 2013 broke an anti-graffiti law but Detective Christopher Tucker failed to take other people into custody whose slogans didn’t attack the police, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in reversing a lower court dismissal of their lawsuit.
“A reasonable officer in Detective Tucker’s position had fair notice that the First Amendment prohibited arresting plaintiffs for the content of their speech,” the court said in a 3-0 ruling reported by the San Francisco Chronicle.
If the ruling stands, it would apply to federal courts in California and eight other states.
Tucker could ask the U.S. Supreme Court to review the decision. His attorney wasn’t immediately available for comment, the Chronicle said.
The protesters belonged to the Sunset Activist Collective and they began writing anti-police messages on Las Vegas sidewalks in 2011. In June 2013, they were writing slogans outside the police station. Officers asked them to stop, urged them to use protests signs instead and issued citations but didn’t arrest them.
Tucker, however, reviewed the case and ordered their arrest at another protest in August, although authorities didn’t prosecute them, and some participants whose messages didn’t attack police weren’t arrested.
The ruling is “a win for free speech and police accountability,” said the plaintiffs’ lead attorney, Devi Rao of the MacArthur Justice Center in Washington, D.C.
Illinois
Man sentenced for throwing explosive into restaurant
CHICAGO (AP) — A man was sentenced to five years in prison for throwing an explosive device through the window of a suburban Chicago restaurant in 2020 during civil unrest that followed George Floyd’s death in Minneapolis police custody, prosecutors said.
A federal judge in Chicago sentenced Diego Vargas, 27, of Aurora last week. He had faced up to 20 years in prison after pleading guilty last year to throwing an explosive device through the window of the Egg Harbor Cafe in Naperville on June 1, 2020, resulting in two explosions.
The restaurant was closed at the time and no injuries were reported, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Chicago said in a news release announcing Vargas’ sentencing.
Vargas attacked the restaurant during civil unrest that followed a peaceful protest in Naperville against racial injustice in the wake of the death of George Floyd, the Black man killed by a white Minneapolis police officer in May 2020.
Vargas was also accused of causing up to $10,000 in vandalism damage at several businesses in downtown Naperville the same night the restaurant was attacked.
But those charges were quashed following his sentencing in the federal case, according to DuPage County court records, The (Arlington Heights) Daily Herald reported.
Tennessee
Former deputy avoids prison time in rape case
MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) — A former Tennessee sheriff’s deputy who had been charged with raping a 14-year-old girl must serve probation but no prison time after he pleaded guilty to a lesser charge, authorities said.
Brian O. Beck, 47, was charged in 2018 with two counts of rape by force or coercion and two counts of sexual battery by an authority figure, the Shelby County district attorney’s office said.
Beck joined the Shelby County sheriff’s office in 2004. He has been fired.
Investigators said the sexual activity began around May 1, 2016, when the girl was 14, and continued until around Jan. 1, 2018, prosecutors said in a 2018 news release.
Beck pleaded guilty Feb. 28 to a reduced charge of aggravated assault and received a sentence of four years, which was suspended while he serves three years’ probation, the district attorney’s office said. Beck could be sent to prison if he violates probation, prosecutors said.
“Given the totality of the evidence, we ethically could not proceed to trial on the indicted offenses,” Shelby County district attorney Amy Weirich said in a statement. “This decision was made in consultation with the victim.”
Beck also must complete community service, and he is barred from contacting the victim.
Alabama
Woman accused of killing her boyfriend in interstate rundown
MOBILE, Ala. (AP) — A Florida woman making a cross-country drive with her boyfriend allegedly let him out on Interstate 10 and then intentionally ran him down, killing him, authorities said.
Johana Suarez, 37, of Miami, was jailed on a charge of murder in the death of Henry Hernandez, 48. The man was found dead early Sunday alongside Interstate 10 west of Mobile, Alabama.
A judge refused to set bond for Suarez on Tuesday after prosecutors said she had no ties to the area and was a threat to flee, news outlets reported. But the decision could be reconsidered at a hearing Thursday.
The two were westbound for California and spent Saturday night in Mississippi, Capt. Paul Burch of the Mobile County Sheriff’s Office told WALA-TV. He said they got up early Sunday and headed off in the wrong direction, resulting in an argument that ended with Hernandez getting out of the vehicle with his belongings just miles (kilometers) into Alabama.
“She drove away. She didn’t get too far away, turned around began traveling westbound in the eastbound lanes of I-10 and struck him at a high rate of speed pretty much killing him instantly,” Burch said.
He added that evidence from the vehicle’s computer system showed the car was traveling at 73 mph (117 kph) upon impact.
Suarez was uninjured in the crash. She didn’t immediately have a lawyer who could speak on her behalf.
Montana
Man sentenced to 100 years for killing wife
KALISPELL, Mont. (AP) — A western Montana man has been sentenced to 100 years in prison for killing his wife in December 2020 by beating and strangling her and throwing her down a flight of stairs.
Bradley Jay Hillious, 35, was sentenced Tuesday for the death of Amanda Hillious, 33, after District Court Judge Robert Allison denied his request for a new trial, the Daily Inter Lake reports.
Amanda Hillious was fatally injured on Dec. 15, 2020 and died four days later.
Her mother, Michelle Wungluck, who is raising Amanda’s four children, said she “wants those kids to grow up knowing they are safe and secure,” and asked for the maximum sentence.
Hillious, who did not testify at trial, read a statement at sentencing in which he said his father, Scott Hillious was the “more likely suspect.”
Scott Hillious killed himself on Dec, 24, 2020, after a detective called to ask Hillious and his father to come in for an interview.
Hillious was convicted on Jan. 14 after a trial in which Amanda’s son from a previous relationship, now 12, testified that “Brad killed my mom.” He told jurors he heard Bradley Hillious and his mother arguing before he saw him dragging and hitting her.
Defense attorney Jami Rebsom unsuccessfully sought a new trial, arguing prosecutors made improper comments during closing arguments and that evidence suggests a lesser charge of mitigated deliberate homicide should have been filed.
Allison said the defense didn’t present any evidence at trial that Bradley Hillious should have been convicted of a lesser charge.
“It was an all-or-nothing approach,” he said of the defense case.
Rebsom said she plans to appeal the conviction, saying she was not allowed to argue a case around the suicide of Scott Hillious, who was at the house when Amanda Hillious was fatally injured. She questioned how his suicide could “not be seen as a confession.”
Allison said it was the defense counsel that was concerned about bringing up the suicide at trial, believing the state was going to argue that Bradley Hillious killed his father and “that there might be evidence along those lines presented.”
Prosecutors were only allowed to refer to Scott’s death “as his death or suicide, not his questionable death or possible murder,” Allison said.
California
Arrest made in 1994 killing of woman
RIVERSIDE, Calif. (AP) — A Southern California man has been charged with stabbing to death a woman in Desert Hot Springs nearly three decades ago after DNA from bite marks and blood linked him to the killing, prosecutors announced Tuesday.
Sharron Gadlin, 48, of Glendale, was arrested last Friday and is charged with the April 1994 murder of Cheri Huss. Huss, 39, was stabbed several times in her apartment and also was bitten by her killer, the Riverside County district attorney’s office said in a statement.
Huss fought back and her attacker left blood and saliva but the DNA couldn’t be matched until this month, when a cold case team used forensic genetic genealogy to identify Gadlin, who lived about a dozen miles away from Huss at the time of the killing, the DA’s office said.
“I hope Cheri and her family will finally get the justice they deserve,” District Attorney Mike Hestrin said.
Gadlin was jailed on $1 million bail. It wasn’t immediately clear whether he had an attorney who could speak on hiss behalf.
