A former Virginia Beach nurse aide was sentenced for identity theft and conspiracy Friday.

United States District Judge Arenda Wright Allen sentenced  36-year-old Emmanuel Effiong to 81 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised released, for conspiracy to defraud the government and aggravated identity theft, according to Dana Boente, Acting United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia.

http://liarcatchers.com/identity_theft_investigation.html

Boente said Effiong pleaded guilty to the charges on October 11, 2013.

According to court documents, Effiong and his codefendant, Festus Ighalo, were formerly nurse aides at Sentara’s Virginia General Hospital in Virginia Beach and used their positions to obtain Personally Identifiable Information from thousands of patients, mostly located in the Hampton Roads area.

Effiong and Ighalo are originally from Nigeria and now naturalized U.S. citizens. They got help from others in the U.S. and Nigeria to use the information — which included birth dates and social security numbers — to submit fraudulent federal tax returns with the Internal Revenue Service and receive tax refunds in the patients’ names.

Boente said Ighalo also pleaded guilty and will be sentenced on January 24.

A Florida man was sentenced to 9½ years in prison Thursday for his role in a sophisticated, multimillion-dollar identity theft/tax refund scam uncovered by good luck and good police work.

In a case still under investigation by the IRS, Ramoth Jean, 33, of Miami, was sentenced after pleading guilty in October to charges of conspiracy to commit mail fraud and wire fraud and aggravated identity theft.

http://liarcatchers.com/identity_theft_investigation.html

It’s an anniversary that would break any parents’ heart.

Twelve years ago Friday, a Georgetown woman vanished and became the focus of one of the area’s most mysterious missing persons cases. Now, Rachel Cooke’s mother and investigators are asking for the public’s help to bring her home.

“Rachel was a ball of energy. There wasn’t enough hours in the day,” said Rachel’s mother, Janet Cooke. “She loved life, and she was a very compassionate individual.”

They’re precious memories of a daughter she hasn’t seen in 12 years.

http://liarcatchers.com/missing_persons_investigations.html

She’s begging anyone who knows what may have happened to the 19-year-old college student to end the mystery and tell her where to find her child.

“We’ve got to bring this to an end,” Janet said. “If not for my peace of mind, then for the perpetrator’s peace of mind. Let’s end it.”

Rachel Cooke was home for Christmas break when she decided to go for a run. A neighbor reported seeing her just 200 yards from her home. She was never seen again.

For weeks, Texas Equusearch and hundreds from the community looked for any sign of Rachel. They found nothing.

The weeks became months, then years.

Now, two new Williamson County detectives, James Knutson and Jason Waldon, are assigned to Rachel’s case.

“We are taking the approach of starting at step one, as if we were on the ground the day that this occurred, and going from there,” said Knutson. “We’ve spent the past three months going through recordings [and] reading case files, witness statements, canvas reports and anything else.”

They said they’re developing new leads everyday.

“Somebody out there somewhere knows exactly what happened, and we need that one phone call,” said Williamson County Sheriff’s Department spokesman Fred Thomas.

In the meantime, Rachel’s mother can only imagine the memories they would have shared.  Rachel would be 31 this year.

“She would probably be married, probably [have] children. There [could be] grandchildren. I don’t know. It’s tough,” Janet said.

There is still a $50,000 reward for reliable information leading to the return or location of Rachel Cooke or to the identity of any person involved in her disappearance.

If you have any information, please call Williamson County Crime Stoppers at 1-800-253-7867, or visit wilcocrimetips.org.

A Florida private investigator says he believes more than a dozen missing persons cases from Kentucky and surrounding states may be connected.

The faces of the young women on Bill Warner’s blog are similar but behind each smile is a different family searching for answers.

“It just escalated over the last two or three years,” Warner said. “It continued, the same profile, young female with long blond hair, same petite size, it just kept happening over and over and over again.”

http://liarcatchers.com/missing_persons_investigations.html

Warner says his interest began with a case in Tennessee and spread from there. Now he spotlights at least 17 women who have gone missing or were murdered, and he believes there may be a connection to Central Kentucky.

“It’s kind of a center point, north, south, east, and west, you draw a big circle and Lexington is in the middle,” he said.

One of the earliest cases on his web page is from Lexington. The body of 18-year-old Misty Gwinner was found on North Cleveland Road in 2005. She was last seen in Florence.

“And there was no person of interest, there was no suspect, there was nothing for these families to get some closure, it just kept happening,” Warner said.

The latest face on his wall belongs to Brookelyn Farthing, who was 18 years old when she disappeared. She’s been missing since June of last year from Madison County. Kentucky State Police are investigating her disappearance. They say they’ve investigated every scenario they can and don’t believe her case is connected to any others.

Warner says he doesn’t want to hinder any local investigations but believes some of the cases, including four of them from Kentucky, may be connected.

“I’m looking at 17 different girls who all look exactly alike, and every individual area, whether it’s state police or local police, they all say the same thing, it’s not connected to the others,” he said.

“Maybe this needs national attention that all these young girls who look like they’re all sisters have all just totally vanished without any kind of leads.”

Warner says he hopes those leads come and that they bring answers to more than a dozen families.

A central Kentucky woman convicted of stealing from two disabled veterans received maximum jail time from a judge on Friday.

Cammie Henson, the once trusted cleaning lady turned friend and caregiver who “cleaned out” blind Korean war vet Jack Browning’s bank account to the tune of $20,000, was sentenced to a maximum of 25 years in prison for two counts of knowingly exploiting an adult.

Henson also ripped off Jack Browning, Jr., a disabled vet who was also under her care at the time.

http://liarcatchers.com/fraud_investigation.html

When Henson stole from the Brownings, she was on probation and paying back money she stole from a Shelby County Church Daycare where she once worked.

The Browning’s family members feel betrayed on many levels, but are glad the judge didn’t lower Henson’s punishment.

“No remorse, no nothing. I trusted her. She was a trusted friend until she blasted that trust right out of the water on me,” said Gina Browning.

Henson got a 25 year sentence, but she’ll be eligible for parole in 5 years.

An Oldham County, Kentucky man was sentenced to 18 months in prison and ordered to pay a $114,936.98 in restitution yesterday by U.S. District Court Judge John G. Heyburn, II for defrauding five banks located in Oldham County, announced David J. Hale, United States Attorney for the Western District of Kentucky.

James Distler, age 45, pleaded guilty to a five count federal grand jury indictment on September 20, 2013. The charges included three counts of bank fraud and two counts of wire fraud.

http://liarcatchers.com/fraud_investigation.html

In court, Distler admitted to opening bank accounts, under false names, between August 2009 and November 2011, to negotiate and attempt to negotiate worthless checks totaling nearly $115,000.

According to the plea agreement, between August and December 2009, Distler opened a bank account in the name of Air Vegas at Bank of America in Oldham County, Kentucky, and then knowingly used the bank account to negotiate and attempt to negotiate worthless checks totaling $78,845. Between June and July 2010, Distler opened a bank account in the name of Express Jet at U.S. Bank in Oldham County and then knowingly used U.S. Bank’s check processing company, Elavon Inc., to negotiate and attempt to negotiate worthless checks totaling $40,778.51. During the course of the scheme he caused an interstate wire communication between Knoxville, Tennessee, and Oldham County, Kentucky. Then, between July and August 2010, Distler opened a bank account in the name of Express Jet at Capital One Bank in Oldham County and then knowingly used the bank account to negotiate and attempt to negotiate worthless checks totaling $18,302. Between July and August 2010, James Distler opened a bank account in the name of Express Jet at Old National Bank in Oldham County and then knowingly used the bank account to negotiate and attempt to negotiate worthless checks totaling $16,756. Lastly, between November 2010 and January 2011, Distler opened a bank account in the name of Ejet Solutions at PNC Bank in the name of Ejet Solutions and then used the account to negotiate payments processed by Erentpayment LLC to negotiate and attempt to negotiate worthless rent payments totaling $16,380. During the course of the scheme he caused an interstate wire communication between Denver, Colorado, and Oldham County, Kentucky.

This case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Bryan Calhoun and was investigate by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).

Pasadena Police are looking for any information regarding the whereabouts of a Pasadena man last seen on December 31, 2013.

A Rockcastle County man has been arrested and charged after police say he kept money from donations he said would go to the Brookelyn Farthing Reward Fund.

Randy Gross was arrested Tuesday by the Kentucky State Police, charged with theft.

According to court documents, Gross collected monetary donations from Dec. 4-6 at the NACCO Materials Handling Group factory in Berea, alleging the money would go towards the reward fund for the search for Brookelyn Farthing, a Madison County teen who has been missing since June.

http://liarcatchers.com/fraud_investigation.html

KSP said Gross admitted to keeping the $263 he collected, during an interview at his Mount Vernon home.

Gross has since been released from jail.

He said in a phone interview Friday he was threatened by a detective, so he admitted to keeping the cash. But says he had every intention on giving the money to the family, and still intends to do so.

The ringleader of a mail theft, identity theft and bank fraud scheme that had more than 800 victims in southern Oregon has been sentenced to 13 years and five months in federal prison.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Byron Chatfield said after Tuesday’s sentencing in Medford that Robert Lee Powelson and his co-conspirators stole thousands of pieces of mail from homes and businesses.

http://liarcatchers.com/identity_theft_investigation.html

The information was used to obtain credit cards, cash stolen personal checks and open American Express Bluebird reloadable cards in the names of the victims. The attempted fraud totaled well over $200,000.

Powelson, a 30-year-old Medford resident, also eluded police during two high-speed chases.

Two co-conspirators from Medford — 32-year-old Dallas Lee Tedford and 23-year-old Kayla Strange — were sentenced to shorter prison terms on Monday for conspiracy to commit mail theft, conspiracy to commit bank fraud and aggravated identity theft.

Two other defendants are to be sentenced within a few weeks.

An odd phone call prompted an Albuquerque man to report his son missing six weeks ago, and now police are asking the public’s help in locating him.

Gregory Tikkanen, 48, was last seen on Nov. 28 during a weekly meeting with his father.  Police said Tikkanen has been living on the streets and received money for the upcoming week from his father during the meetings.

http://liarcatchers.com/missing_persons_investigations.html

A few days after the last meeting the father received a phone call from a local number and didn’t recognize the male voice. The man told the father he’d obtained the father’s number from the side of an arroyo.

The father then reported Tikkanen as missing.

Tikkanen is 6 feet tall, weighs 150 pounds and has brown hair and brown eyes.

Anyone with information on his disappearance of whereabouts can contact the Albuquerque Police Department Missing Person Unit and (505) 924-6096 or 235-1039.