Pennsylvania

Santos charged in 2017 with theft over bad checks to dog breeders in Pennsylvania Amish country

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The case was confirmed as “theft by deception” by the York County District Legal professional’s Workplace, which informed CNN it was later dismissed.

However it marks the most recent disclosure in regards to the embattled New York Republican whose brief tenure in Congress has been dominated by questions on his repeated fabrications about his background and resume and inquiries about his marketing campaign funds.

Santos is going through a number of investigations, together with an FBI probe into allegations that he took off with cash raised by way of his pet charity to supply medical look after the dying canine of a veteran.

CNN has reached out to Santos’ congressional workplace and to his private lawyer. Final month, in response to experiences in regards to the dying canine, Santos tweeted that his work in “animal advocacy was the labor of affection and laborious work” and referred to as the allegations “surprising and insane.”

The Pennsylvania case, first reported by Politico, centered on a sequence of 9 checks totaling greater than $15,000 that went to the canine breeders, in response to Tiffany Bogosian, a childhood pal of Santos and personal-injury lawyer who mentioned she assisted Santos in February 2020 after he was served with an extradition warrant.

She mentioned she despatched an e-mail to a Pennsylvania state trooper, a duplicate of which she supplied to CNN, on Santos’ behalf, outlining his competition that considered one of his 4 checkbooks had gone lacking earlier than the unhealthy checks had been written.

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“He instantly referred to as his financial institution upon studying 1/4 verify books was lacking and all checks had been canceled at the moment, with a cease pay on all checks,” Bogosian wrote on the time. She mentioned Santos had been the “sufferer of fraud” as had the individuals who obtained the checks. She additionally hooked up copies of the checks, a number of of which mentioned “puppies” within the memo subject.

She mentioned she didn’t formally function Santos’ lawyer and couldn’t characterize him within the Pennsylvania matter, as she isn’t licensed to observe within the state.

In an interview Thursday with CNN, Bogosian mentioned Santos later informed her that the costs had been dismissed.

Kyle King, a spokesperson for the York County district lawyer, informed CNN that the case was listed as “withdrawn or dismissed.”

Bogosian, who attended junior highschool with Santos, mentioned she now not believes Santos’ account about what transpired with the checks.

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And in latest weeks, she has emerged as a vocal critic of the congressman. “I will expose him to the fullest diploma as a lot as I can,” she mentioned Thursday.

Earlier this yr, in an interview with The Washington Publish, she described an effort by Santos to steer considered one of her shoppers, Christian Lopez, to spend money on Harbor Metropolis Capital Corp. Santos labored on the agency in 2020 and 2021. Lopez had been awarded $2 million in insurance coverage cash after being injured when a drunk driver smashed into his parked automotive. Lopez informed CNN that Santos would not supply particulars on the place the cash can be invested, and he declined to speculate.
The Securities and Change Fee filed a criticism in April 2021 towards Harbor Metropolis and its founder, Jonathan P. Maroney, alleging the corporate ran a $17 million “Ponzi scheme.”

Neither Santos nor different workers are named within the SEC criticism. Santos has maintained that he was unaware and never concerned in any potential wrongdoing on the firm.

On Thursday, Bogosian mentioned she and Lopez had been interviewed final month by the Securities and Change Fee investigators in relation to Harbor Metropolis.



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