Feds, State Officials Meet on Criminal Enforcment of Drilling

Oversight of, or enforcement against Marcellus Shale gas drillers might call to mind the federal Environmental Protection Agency or the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection.
Last week in State College more than 200 federal, state and local law enforcement officers, prosecutors and environmental officials from Pennsylvania, New York, West Virginia and Ohio participated in a 2-day Marcellus Shale Law Enforcement Training Conference.

The conference focused on potential environmental impacts and law enforcement issues arising from the rapid expansion of drilling in the Marcellus Shale region.

Ignacio Moreno, Assistant Attorney General at the Justice Department, said oil and gas extraction is occurring with increasing frequency......
"We must ensure that all laws intended to protect human health, sources of drinking water, wildlife and the environment are well understood and enforced to mitigate any potential adverse effects."

According to David Hickton, U.S. Attorney for Western Pennsylvania, the conference provided an overview of state and federal requirements that companies and subcontractors must follow to ensure that workers, the public and the environment are not put at risk. Hickton says his office has a responsibility to prosecute environmental crimes....
"If the frack water (used to break the shale and released the gas) is not handled properly and, for example, is dumped without proper disposition, there would be potential criminal issues involved."

Hickton says cooperation with state and local law enforcement is imperative because the federal authorities "do not have enough boots on the ground to cover the entire state." He says one goal of the conference was to create a "force multiplier" where all law enforcement works together to enforce the various laws.
"I think the buzzword for our current approach is we're trying to be alert, informed and vigilant and the public should know we're going to do our part to protect the law so that whatever is done with Marcellus Shale is done legally and appropriately."

Child Porn Ring Broken But "Industry" Keeps Growing

A 43 year old man who went by the screen name "Mr. Tinkertrain" became the 8th and final member of an online pornography ring to be sentenced in federal court in Pittsburgh Thursday. David Dean of Arizona was sentenced to 15 years in federal prison.

Member of the group posted and shared thousands of images and videos in a private room on the popular social networking site Multiply.com.
"The abuse in this case was shocking and involved graphic sexual assault of children as young as two and four years old," said U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director John Morton. "There is little in this world that is more depraved than that."

The eight men who were considered to be leading the group all pleaded guilty. Investigators identified at least 150 other member, 22 of them have been prosecuted.
"The people who commit these crimes do not just stop with one photograph or one video," said Morton. "They search out photograph after photograph, video after video, they exchange new materials and seek out fresh images. With every photography, every new video, comes a new victim."

Morton and David Hickton, U.S. Attorney for Western Pennsylvania, said that despite their efforts the child pornography industry is growing because Morton says "the Internet has allowed this particular crime to occur in different and more aggressive ways than in the past."

Illegal Alien Worker Scam Case Finished

What started as a traffic stop in the North Hills of Pittsburgh ended Monday with the sentencing of Alexander Litt for his role in harboring illegal aliens and hiring them out to unsuspecting businesses.

The 47 year old from Russia was the last of 6 defendants to be sentenced. Litt faces 56 months in jail followed by three years on supervised release. U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania David Hickton says Litt will face an immigration status hearing after his release.

Hickton says Litt and his co-conspirators would hire out the workers to restaurants and hotels for ten dollars an hour and then pay the workers six dollars an hour. On top of that, those who were here illegally would be housed in cramped quarters and forced to pay rent to the company. They were also forced to pay for transportation to and from work in company owned vans.

Hickton says during peak seasons the workers in Pittsburgh and Ohio would work for 20 hours a day but never see any overtime. “The significance of this case lies in the fact that recruitment and exploitation of cheap alien labor occurs daily around the country,” says Hickton

Hickton says the majority of the workers were “out-of-status” aliens. Most came here legally, however many of their visas had expired. Others were here under visas that did not allow them to work. At least 53 of the more than 100 workers involved in the case have been deported. Most were from former Soviet block countries.

As part of their collective sentences the defendants were forced to pay $2.5 million in forfeitures to the federal government.

Crackdown on Mortgage Fraud

The Mortgage Fraud Task Force of the U.S. Attorney's Office is marking its 3rd anniversary today with the filing of charges against another 14 individuals connected to 7 different fraudulent schemes.
U.S. Attorney David Hickton says in those 3 years, 105 defendants have been charged with 75 of them convicted or pleading guilty, and the remaining cases are pending..."this is a very important priority for this office."
Hickton says he believes that the mortgage fraud problem has peaked and that the task force has been a factor....
"We also have to acknowledge that the environment which created this with less restrictions has been remedied by the banking community and others. So, we think the problem is on the wane, but it's still there."
Hickton says over the last 3 years the indictments have involved 2,500 properties and $500 million in fraudulent loans, and that anyone who participates in the fraudulent transactions should be aware....
"If it's the seller, the borrower, the closing agent, the mortgage broker or the appraiser, they're all potential targets of these prosecutions."
According to Hickton, mortgage fraud is a double whammy for owners trying to pay for their homes...
"It hits many of our communities where people are struggling. It leaves people in a position where the community has been affected, homes are abandoned, families are victimized and then it can lead to a secondary level of crime where the abandoned home becomes a site of secondary criminal activity."
Hickton says there are no plans to end the work of this task force.

U.S. Attorney Indicts 42 in PA Drug Ring

The Pittsburgh U.S. Attorney’s office announced indictments of 42 people on drug trafficking charges today.

39 of the 42 defendants are from the Pittsburgh area and are facing charges of dealing both powder cocaine and crack cocaine in the suburbs east of Pittsburgh. 30 of the 42 have been arrested; 12 remain at-large.

U.S. Attorney David Hickton says the drug ring was involved in Dallas, Texas and Atlanta, Georgia, as well as the eastern suburbs.

Hickton says the FBI led the large-scale investigation, which he hopes will ultimately benefit public safety.

“Freedom from fear is a basic right. Violent criminals who tyrannize our neighborhoods will feel the full force of the law as it can be marshaled by this office,” says Hickton.

Hickton says many of the defendants were often armed but would not discuss any personal histories of violence.

The four separate but related indictments also seek forfeiture of illegal drug proceeds, including two McKeesport properties, a 2010 Mercedes-Benz and three other vehicles.

Each defendant faces a prison sentence of 10 years to life and a fine of $4,000,000.

Hickton Opens Civil Rights Section

The US Attorney’s office in Pittsburgh has set aside five members to serve in a special Civil Rights and Exploitation Section mirroring a growing trend throughout the United States. When US Attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania David Hickton was sworn into office he said he would make civil rights issues a top priority and he has now dedicated the manpower he thinks will be needed to handle the work. He says the unit cannot be judged by the number of cases it takes before the judge. “In civil rights we have an outreach responsibility which we are gong to meet which is not dissimilar to the work we do in national security,” says Hickton, “and in those areas you don’t want to judge us statistically and conclude we are not working very hard just because people are not handling cases.” He suggest another metrics, “The measure of my commitment is the amount of resources I’ve dedicated to this effort.”

Hickton and Justice Department Civil Rights Division Head Thomas Perez met today with members of the region’s various minority communities. They asked those in attendance to be the department’s eyes and ears to help bring the cases to their attention.

Not only is the prosecution of Civil Rights violations a priority of US Attorney Hickton it is also a top priority of the President and the US Attorney General according to Perez. “There are roughly a dozen US Attorneys offices that have established dedicated civil rights units and we are working to raise that number substantially,” says Perez. He says the goal is to make sure the effort is a sustained effort that lasts beyond the current administration. Perez says, “Civil rights is indeed the unfinished business of America and America will never truly be America until the promise of equal opportunity for all is a promise that is indeed realized.”

U.S. Attorney Reorganizes Office

David Hickton announced that he is restructuring the U.S. Attorney's Office in Pittsburgh in an effort to better distribute crimes the office handles throughout the staff. Hickton, the U.S. Attorney for Western PA, will reorganize the Criminal Division into four new sections: Civil Rights and Exploitation, National Security, Violent Crimes and Fraud and Corruption. He also established an Executive Committee of attorneys that will meet with office leadership to address training, planning, diversity, and case review. The changes will take effect on October 24th.

Hickton says the new Civil Rights section will show the office's obligation to addressing hate crimes. "It will send a message inside and outside this office, to the community at large, that we believe that civil rights violations and hate crimes are unacceptable...and that we intend to make it a priority to stop them."

He also says that, although he has created two new positions to make sure his office meets ethical obligations, he has not seen any misconduct from his staff. Hickton says that the posts are mainly to help improve the already high professionalism he has experienced.

The office currently employs 51 assistant attorneys and 60 support staff. And prosecutes civil and criminal cases on behalf of the U.S. in the western part of Pennsylvania.

US Atty Holds Gang Summit

Over the last two days some 500 law enforcement officials and community leaders have gathered in Cranberry to talk about stamping out gang violence in Western Pennsylvania. The US Attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania called the meeting. It is the 5th annual gathering on the subject organized by the office. US Attorney David Hickton says, “this is a battle we must win. The stakes are too high.” Hickton says the meeting is not just a sharing of best practices among the groups involved. He says it is a chance to educate people about the gang problems all communities face. “It is a rural issue as well as an urban issue,” says Hickton. Along with talking about the more well known gangs such as the Crips and Bloods, the summit will also be dealing with Skinheads and neo-Nazis. Hickton says law enforcement can only go so far in combating the problem. He says community groups need to make sure kids have programs to turn to help keep them out of a life of crime. “We need to replace despair and hopelessness with hope and opportunity,” says Hickton. He says there are programs out there to make sure “our children have the choice to take the right path.” Hickton says they have made great strides in combating gang activity in the last 5 years, especially on the Northside.

New Effort Launched to Fight Child Exploitation

The US Department of Justice has launched a nationwide strategy to combat child exploitation but many of the tools are already in use here in Western Pennsylvania. The national program includes a comprehensive threat assessment of the dangers facing children from child pornography, online enticement, and commercial sexual exploitation. Locally, the US Attorney’s office has convened the Western Pennsylvania Crimes Against Children Task Force since 1999. Child exploitation prosecutions have jumped in the region from 5 in 1999 to 267 so far this year. Officials say tat makes the Western District of Pennsylvania one of the busiest offices of its size in the nation. A Child’s Place at Mercy Director Mary Carrasco says much of that can be attributed to the taskforce, “[Child exploitation] is a growing problem but the taskforce has contributed a lot to people working together and coming up with solutions and coming up with new strategies to approach this problem. “ She says when the taskforce first started to meet, some of the members were hesitant to share information but that was quickly overcome. Carassco says as the taskforce worked together, the members found ways to improve the process so children would not have to be repeatedly questioned by different agencies. “I remember a time when we did not ask kids if they were photographed or if there was any Internet component,” says Carassco. That has been important in tracking down child sex offenders.
The improvements have come as recently as this weekend. Using a Depart of Justice grant, Pennsylvania State Police along with Massachusetts State Police and The University of Mass Amherst developed a new tool to track, in real time, individuals sharing child pornography on the Internet. It was used for four hours Sunday. The results were posted for a news conference Monday on a map (above and right) as red markers. Acting US Atty. Robert Cessar says the tool is still very new but it will be used as much as possible, “we are gong to do our darndest to make sure five years from now there is going to be a lot less red on that [map].” Cessar says the maps were not surprising but they “stole his breath away.” “You know it’s out there but until you see a pictorial, or something, it just does not register. But when you look at that, that registers,” says Cessar.
As part of the national effort each region was asked to list their five most wanted fugitives. The five posted by the Western District of PA are all men who have violated the terms of their release to remain in touch with law enforcement as registered sex offenders. Marshall’s office officials say they will use all the tools they have to find all the people on the list.

Obama Nominates New U.S. Atty. for Western PA

Pittsburgh attorney David J. Hickton has been tapped by the Obama Administration to serve as the next U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania. The 54-year-old from Thornburg would not agree to be interviewed but in a brief statement said he was “honored by the nomination” and is “looking forward to working with the senate in the confirmation process.” Hickton is a founding member of Burns, White & Hickton. The law firm was founded in 1987. Before that he was an Associate attorney with Dickie, McCarney and Chilcote and he clerked with Federal Judge Gustave Diamond. He earned his law degree from the University of Pittsburgh in 1981. Pennsylvania’s two sitting senators submitted Hickton’s name to the president. The nomination process is usually an easy process. Former U.S. Attorney Mary Beth Buchanan left office in November to run for Congress, Robert Cessar replaced her on an interim basis.

Feds Reviewing Torture Murder of Greensburg Woman

The Acting U.S. Attorney for Western Pennsylvania is reviewing the torture murder of a mentally disabled woman from Greensburg under a new federal law banning hate crimes against people with disabilities. Robert Cessar says it's too early to tell if his office will file charges against any or all of the six suspects under the Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act signed by President Obama in October.
The 6 suspects: 3 men, 2 women and a 17 year old female, all from Greensburg, face murder, aggravated assault, kidnapping and conspiracy charges in Westmoreland County Court in last week's death of 30 year old Jennifer Daugherty. Her body was found in a trash can in the parking lot of Greensburg Salem Middle School.
Cessar says he needs to do more research to determine whether his office might file an extra charge against the suspects or bring the entire case into federal court.

Master Hacker Faces Stiff Sentence

Max Ray Vision, a mastermind computer hacker was sentenced to 13 years in federal prison today and ordered to pay $27.5 million in restitution for stealing more than a million bank and credit card numbers. Vision, formerly named Butler, at one time voluntarily cooperated with the FBI. But he turned to hacking the kinds of systems he once helped protect and according to Assistant U.S. Attorney Luke Dembosky, credit card companies Visa, MasterCard, American Express and Discover attributed more than $86 million in fraudulent purchases to credit card numbers found in Vision’s possession. Vision’s attorney Michael Novara noted that Vision saw less than a million dollars in personal financial gain.

The 13-year sentence is the longest sentence handed down for hacking in the United States to date. In a Federal courtroom in Pittsburgh, U.S. District Judge Maurice Cohill asked Vision if he had anything to say on his own behalf and Vision explained that he got caught up in the thrill of hacking, but had changed and no longer found it appealing. Novara called the sentence excessive for someone like Vision whose talents could be used for the greater good.

Dembosky says it was a four year effort to infiltrate the criminal network and identify and move in on Vision. He called the sentence bittersweet because of the waste of Vision’s intellect and talent, and the importance of bringing a measure of justice to the victims. He hopes Vision uses his gifts to benefit other people as he has done at times in the past. It has been intimated that Vision is cooperating with other federal investigations.

U.S. Attorney Buchanan to Resign

U.S. Attorney for Western Pennsylvania Mary Beth Buchanan says she will step down November 16. Buchanan was appointed in September 2001 after 13 years as ans Assistant U.S. Attorney. She says serving the Western District of Pennsylvania has been and honor and she's looking forward to the next chapter in her career. She did not say what that would be, but she's been mentioned as a possible Republican candidate for Congress to challenge Democratic incumbent Jason Altmire next year.

Her replacement will probably be made by the traditional “advise and consent” process rather than the quick nomination method used by the Bush administration.
That’s according to Duquesne University Law Professor Joseph Mistick who says the eventual nominee will be confirmed by the U.S. Senate in the traditional fashion, rather than by a simple nomination.

“It is possible, with a change that the Bush administration sponsored to the Patriot Act, that the Attorney General could appoint a United States Attorney as an interim U.S. Attorney, and that would bypass the advise and consent process,” says Mistick. “That’s frowned upon, of course, because the other process has served us very well throughout our history.”

He says the advise and consent process is much more beneficial to specific regions, because US Attorneys often hold a regional role as more than just a prosecutor.

“In the early 90s, for example, now State Attorney General Tom Corbett … was instrumental in the creation of and the adoption of the Weed and Seed program and successfully joined with the City of Pittsburgh to have that program instituted here."

Mistick says many policies of the Bush administration regarding U.S. Attorneys were controversial, including the 2006 dismissal of seven U.S. Attorneys for vague reasons. He says the Obama administration will most likely stay away from those policies.

“We generally get top-flight folks here, because you have to get a lot of clearances, you’re going through a lot of procedures in order to be appointed, and by the time somebody does that, you can rest assured that it’s a qualified person.”

Mistick says the only name he’s heard up for the opening position is local commercial attorney David J. Hickton.

Wecht Off Hook

Federal fraud charges against former Allegheny County Coroner Cyril Wecht have been dropped. U.S. Attorney Mary Beth Buchanan asked a judge to dismiss the remaining 14 charges against Wecht saying she no longer felt she had enough evidence to get a conviction. Last year a federal jury was declared to be hung on more than 80 counts. Last month a judge ruled that key evidence was gathered under a search warrant that was too broad and could not be used in court. Buchanan says without that evidence it would be very hard to prosecute but she says her mind has not changed on the validity of the case. Buchanan says, “If I could have a do-over, I'd still bring the case. This was a use of county resources. A use of our taxpayer dollars for private gain. That’s fraud. That’s a crime.” The prosecution had alleged that Wecht used county employees and assets to further his private pathology business. Buchanan says the judges evidentiary ruling will be used as a teaching tool for new prosecutors entering the office. She says, "This is something I doubt will ever happen again in the Western District of Pennsylvania."

Judge Throws Out Evidence Against Wecht

Evidence collected by FBI agents that is key to the 14 remaining fraud and theft charges against former Allegheny County Coroner Dr. Cycril Wecht, is being thrown out by U.S. District Judge Sean McLaughlin. He says the search warrants they used were unconstitutional and is excluding more than 20 boxes of evidence taken in 2005 from Wecht's office, as well as evidence from a laptop used by one of his secretaries. Wecht is charged with using his public office for private gain, and his attorney Jerry McDevitt says he cannot see the case being pursued very much further.
U.S. Attorney Mary Beth Buchanan will make a recommendation on whether to continue the case, but the decision is up to the U.S. solicitor general.