 |
| Anthony Schmitka |
Anthony
Schmitka, 58, was sentenced in Fall River Superior Court after pleading
guilty Friday to two counts of larceny from a person older than 60,
Quinn said.
Under the sentence handed down by Judge Renee Dupuis, Schmitka must serve at least 27 months in prison.
Schmitka was charged in 2014 in
Attleboro District Court but fled on the day of his trial in March 2016.
He spent the next three years as a fugitive from justice until his
arrest March 6, soon after Quinn unveiled the Bristol County Most Wanted
Fugitive List and website to field tips on wanted individuals.
Schmitka
was one of the first fugitives highlighted during a news conference
with state police and local police chiefs. He was tracked down and
apprehended in Woodstock, Vt. by U.S. marshals after Norton police got a
tip about his whereabouts.
In
February 2013, Schmitka’s father, who is a U.S. military veteran,
received a retroactive benefits check for more than $110,000 from the
Department of Veterans Affairs. Over the course of a year, the defendant
stole the money and used a portion of it to play the lottery and gamble
at a local casino, according to the district attorney’s office.
“I am very pleased the defendant was
held accountable for stealing more than $100,000 from his elderly
father,” Quinn said in a statement. “Not only did the defendant betray
his father’s trust, he defaulted from court and fled to Vermont, where
he lived off of government assistance.
“The
money that he stole was from the Department of Veterans Affairs and was
based on the victim’s military service, which makes the defendant’s
conduct particularly ‘unconscionable.’”
The case was prosecuted by Assistant District Attorney Michael Scott, the chief of Quinn’s Financial Crimes Unit.
Full Article & Source:
Ex-Norton man sent to prison for bilking elderly father
No comments:
Post a Comment