Nigger steals 184 grand from Cincinnati

Gman

Gman

News Editor
Empire Theatre Developer Found Guilty

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Pettus-Brown Skipped Town With $184,000 Of City Money

POSTED: 2:12 pm EST November 23, 2004
UPDATED: 2:32 pm EST November 23, 2004

CINCINNATI -- A former concert promoter and pro basketball player who promised to redevelop an Over-The-Rhine theater was found guilty Tuesday of stealing $184,000 from the city.




Lashawn Pettus-Brown (pictured, left) was supposed to redevelop the Empire Theatre. Instead, he took the city's money and skipped town.

A Tri-state jury returned the verdict shortly after 1 p.m. He was found guilty on three counts of fraud and three counts of money laundering.

Pettus-Br
own disappeared in 2002 and was on the loose for more than a year before he was caught in New York last January. A woman did a Google s
earch on him before a date. When he showed up to meet her, so did federal investigators.

Pettus-Brown countersued the city last March, claiming it did not provide appropriate assistance needed to meet the goals of the project.

Sentencing has not been scheduled, but officials estimate the hearing will take place after Feb. 1, 2005.

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Whoever trusted this nigger with city money and thought the job would get done should be fired for being stupid!! Put a nigger in charge of money and it will be stolen. Put a nigger in charge of children and they will be raped!! Put a nigger in charge of........., well, I think you see where this is going!!

gman
 
Originally posted by Gman@Nov 23 2004, 03:05 PM
Pettus-Brown Skipped Town With $184,000 Of City Money


Whoever trusted this nigger with city money and thought the job would get done should be fired for being stupid!! Put a nigger in charge of money and it will be stolen. Put a nigger in charge of children and they will be raped!! Put a nigger in charge of........., well, I think you see where this is going!!

gman
Click to expand...


They are a breed that is easily distracted and led astray by any temptation; money, a chicken wing, crack, an old woman
 
Federal judge tosses out wire-fraud conviction

Photo of nigger at link!

A federal judge ordered Tuesday that LaShawn Pettus-Brown be released from jail, throwing out his conviction for spending taxpayers' money on himself instead of Cincinnati's Empire Theater project.

The ruling stunned federal authorities and was a blow to city officials who blame Pettus-Brown for derailing a project they touted as the key to turning around Vine Street in Over-the-Rhine.

The failed project cost the city more than $180,000, plus another $50,000 to raze the theater.

"I am absolutely flabbergasted," Mayor Char
lie Luken said. "I'm sure everyone at the city is."

In her 13-page decision, U.S. District Ju
dge Sandra Beckwith agreed that prosecutors proved that Pettus-Brown defrauded the city when he took money intended to renovate the vacant theater into a nightclub and instead spent it on meals, shoes, limousines and rap concerts.

But the judge said prosecutors failed to show that the fraud violated federal laws against wire fraud and money laundering.

Beckwith reversed a jury verdict that found Pettus-Brown guilty of those charges in November.

She ordered his immediate release from the Grant County, Ky., jail, where he has been held for almost a year.

"The court is not excusing the defendant's conduct," Beckwith wrote in her decision. "It is readily apparent that the defendant perpetrated a calculated and sophisticated fraud on the city of Cincinnati."

<span
style='color:red'>She said her decision to dismiss the charges rests on a "technical and narrow, but nonetheless important, legal point."</span>

Federal prosecutors, who s
aid they might appeal the ruling, had argued during the trial that Pettus-Brown committed wire fraud when he electronically transferred money from the city to accounts in New Jersey, Australia and Japan.

They said the money Pettus-Brown sent to those accounts came from fraudulent vouchers he submitted to the city as the developer of the theater project.

But Pettus-Brown's lawyer, Kelly Johnson, said the wire transfers occurred after his client obtained the city's money and were never part of the alleged fraud.

That distinction is important because federal law requires prosecutors to prove the transfers were part of the fraud - not just a means to spend the profits of the fraud.

And that, Beckwith said, is where the prosecution failed.

"The evidence at trial sho
wed only that these wire transfers were the mechanism through which the defendant spent or disbursed the money he stole," the judge wrote.

Since the money-laundering charges involved "the proceeds of wire fraud,"
the judge also dismissed those charges.

"Obviously, I'm very pleased with the judge's opinion," Johnson said. "This is the position we took from the beginning."

Johnson said the decision was especially gratifying because the case was challenging, in part because of his often-strained relationship with his client.

Pettus-Brown tried to fire Johnson just weeks before the trial, claiming that the veteran public defender was not sharing important information with him. Pettus-Brown agreed to stick with Johnson only after Beckwith gave him a choice: keep his lawyer or go to trial without one.

Pettus-Brown could not be reached late Tuesday.

The news hit city officials hard. The failure of the Empire Theater proje
ct was an embarrassment not only because of the financial cost, but also because it was seen as the linchpin for economic development on Vine Street.

After the project fell apart in late 2002, the city condemned the historic theater and spent $50,000 to tear it down.

"
I just can't believe it," Councilman Jim Tarbell said of Beckwith's ruling. "To go through all this - I just don't know what to say."

Tarbell's complaints about the slow pace of the theater project first caused the city to stop paying Pettus-Brown's voucher requests in 2002. Investigations showed that he had not done the work he had claimed in the vouchers.

Instead, prosecutors said, Pettus-Brown spent much of the city's money on personal expenses, such as plane tickets, dinner at the Maisonette and the promotion of a rap concert in Australia.

City Solicitor Rita McNeil said she doubted that local officials could pursue
state criminal charges against Pettus-Brown because he already has been tried in federal court on similar charges.

The prohibition against being tried twice for the same offense would likely apply, McNeil said.

McNeil, who did not prosecute the case but sat through much of the trial, said federal prosecutors
did a good job.

Luken said federal authorities led the investigation from the beginning and must bear the blame for the judge's decision.

"The feds took total control of this investigation," Luken said. ". . . you'd have to ask them what went wrong."

Fred Alverson, spokesman for U.S. Attorney Greg Lockhart, said prosecutors presented a strong case. He said they might ask Beckwith to reconsider. If she refuses, they could appeal to the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals.

Alverson would not comment when asked if he is concerned that Pettus-Brown could leave the area before an appeal is fil
ed.

Pettus-Brown was a fugitive for most of 2003 and was caught in New York only after a prospective girlfriend ran his name through the Google Internet search engine and learned that he was a wanted man.

**************
:cursin: :cursin: :cursin: :cursin: :cursin:
Wake up America and smell the niggers and the federal judges!

T.N.B.
 
Stupid judges!!! Judges really rule this land and when they are corrupt, God help us all!!! Google search reveals that this woman is stupid white sheeple Clinton Appointee!!

gth.jpg

NEGRO LOVING JUDGE Sandra Beckwith

Gman
 
Originally posted by Gman@Jan 19 2005, 03:03 PM
Stupid judges!!! Judges really rule this land and when they are corrupt, God help us all!!! Google search reveals that this woman is stupid white sheeple Clinton Appointee!!

gth.jpg

NEGRO LOVING JUDGE Sandra Beckwith

Gman
Click to expand...
Now that the nigger is free, I hope he rapes the judge who freed him.

T.N.B.
 
Developer back in jail, this time on state charges

The man accused of defrauding the city of Cincinnati with a failed plan to renovate an Over-the-Rhine theater is jailed this morning in lieu of $2 million bail on state theft charges.

LaShawn Pettus-Brown, 28, accused of spending more than $180,000 in taxpayer money from the city instead of using it to renovate the Empire Theater, appeared in court this morning. Hamilton County Municipal Court Judge Guy Guckenberger set bond at $1 million each on two charges of theft by deception.

The state charges were filed Thursday afternoon, two days after a federal judge overturned Pettus-Brown's conviction in federal court. U.S. District Judge Sandra Beckwith said prosecutors failed to prov
e that Pettus-Brown violated federal laws against
wire fraud and money laundering.

Pettus-Brown turned himself in to police Thursday night on the new charges. He had served nearly a year in jail before the federal charges were overturned and he was released from the Grant County, Ky., jail.

**************
I'm going to sleep better tonight knowing this nigger is behind bars.

T.N.B.
 
Pettus-Brown charged again

Photo of nigger at link.

LaShawn Pettus-Brown was indicted Friday on charges of theft, forgery and tampering with records in connection with the failed Empire Theater project in Cincinnati.

The charges against Pettus-Brown, who received $184,000 from the city to renovate the historic theater, came one week after a judge threw out federal fraud charges against him.

The new charges, based on state law, include allegations that Pettus-Brown falsified a bank document and deceived city officials when he accepted taxpayers' money for the theater project.

Pettus-Brown, 28, is accused of spending money intended for the project on personal expenses, such
as shoes, plane tickets, dinner at the Maisonette and the promotion of
a rap concert in Australia.

City officials had hoped the theater renovation would help spur development on Vine Street in Over-the-Rhine. Instead, the theater fell into disrepair and was later torn down, leaving a vacant lot.

A jury in U.S. District Court convicted Pettus-Brown in November of wire fraud and money laundering.

Prosecutors had argued that Pettus-Brown committed wire fraud when he electronically transferred money from the city to accounts in New Jersey, Australia and Japan.

But Judge Sandra Beckwith reversed the jury verdict last week and ordered Pettus-Brown released, saying he committed a fraud on the city but did not violate federal wire fraud laws in the process.

She said the wire transfers took place after Pettus-Brown received the city's money and were not part of the alleged fraud.

The new charges differ from the federal charges
because they do not hinge on whether Pettus-Brown electronically transferred money out of state. The indict
ment instead focuses on claims that Pettus-Brown used deception to obtain city vouchers valued at more than $184,000.

"There must be accountability when someone is handed this kind of money and he just walks away," Prosecutor Joe Deters said in a statement Friday.

Kelly Johnson, Pettus-Brown's lawyer, could not be reached Friday. Pettus-Brown, who was arrested on theft charges brought by police last week, could face a sentence ranging from probation to 30 years in prison if he is convicted on all charges.

He is being held in the Hamilton County Jail.

He served nearly one year in prison in the federal case.

Federal prosecutors still are considering whether to appeal Beckwith's dismissal.

***************
Wake up America and smell the nigger.

T.N.B.
 
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