Category: National

(NEW YORK) — A Virginia man found guilty of killing his wife and a stranger lured to their home in an elaborate plot to get rid of his spouse so he could be with his au pair was sentenced to life in prison on Friday.

Brendan Banfield was convicted in the 2023 murders of his wife and a man prosecutors said he “catfished” on a fetish website. Prosecutors said Brendan Banfield pretended to be his wife to lure the man to their Fairfax County home for what was believed to be a consensual fake rape scenario in order to frame that stranger for his wife’s murder.

A jury found him guilty of two counts of aggravated murder in February.

“It is a harsh sentence, but in this case it is a justified one,” Judge Penney Azcarate said, noting she had “no hesitation” in handing down the life sentence without the possibility of parole.

“The disregard of the life of your wife, someone you supposedly loved, is almost unfathomable,” she said.

The judge denied a defense motion to overturn his murder convictions on Thursday, ahead of his sentencing.

The former IRS agent was charged with two counts of aggravated murder in 2024 following a monthslong investigation into the deaths of his wife, 37-year-old nurse Christine Banfield, and the stranger, 39-year-old Joseph Ryan.

Prosecutors said Brendan Banfield plotted the murders with the family’s au pair, Juliana Peres Magalhães, with whom he was having an affair. 

Police responded to a 911 call from the home in Reston on Feb. 24, 2023, and found Ryan dead in an upstairs bedroom with gunshot wounds to his head and chest. Christine Banfield had been stabbed seven times in the neck, prosecutors said. 

At the time, Magalhães and Banfield told police they came home to find Ryan stabbing Christine Banfield to death. Banfield and Magalhães each shot Ryan, they said in their 911 call and to responding officers at the scene. 

Magalhães was arrested first and initially charged with second-degree murder for the death of Ryan. She pleaded guilty to manslaughter in 2024 and was sentenced to 10 years in prison, the maximum, in February. Prosecutors said she admitted to shooting Ryan at Brendan Banfield’s direction.

Brendan Banfield was arrested several months after Magalhães and charged with two counts of aggravated murder for the deaths of his wife and Ryan.

Prosecutors said Brendan Banfield stabbed his wife with a kitchen knife that Ryan had been instructed to bring, and, before calling 911, altered the crime scene to make it look as though Ryan stabbed her — including by transferring some of his wife’s blood onto Ryan’s hands.

Magalhães testified against Brendan Banfield during his trial, telling the court that he expressed his desire to “get rid of” his wife in October 2022. She said he told her he wanted to marry her and have children with her, and that he didn’t want to divorce his wife because “she would have more money than he would” and because he wanted custody of the couple’s daughter.

She prayed for forgiveness from the victims’ families during her sentencing hearing.

“There is nothing I could possibly do to make it up to you, for your loss. There are so many regrets, this is my biggest. It’s a tragedy I have been carrying with me, and I know I can never take back the devastation of what I have done,” she said.

Following Magalhães’ sentencing, Fairfax County Commonwealth’s Attorney Steve Descano said the au pair’s testimony was “invaluable in helping the jury understand the convoluted double-murder plot orchestrated by Brendan Banfield.” 

During his three-week-long trial, Brendan Banfield testified in his own defense. He admitted to the affair though maintained his innocence.

He said he came home on Feb. 24, 2023, after the au pair called to alert him about a stranger in the home. He said he went up to his bedroom with his gun drawn and found his wife naked with Ryan and that she called out, “Brendan, he has a knife!”

“I was extremely terrified,” Brendan Banfield told the jury. “I don’t think I’ve ever been more panicked in my life.”

He said he fired his government-issued firearm, striking Ryan in the head, after he said the man appeared to stab his wife. 

The couple’s then-4-year-old daughter was in the basement of the house at the time of the killings. Brendan Banfield was additionally found guilty of child endangerment, as well as using a firearm while committing or attempting to commit murder. 

ABC News’ Sophie Sonnenfeld contributed to this report.

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(WASHINGTON) — A former CIA officer accused of stealing money from the government by lying about his academic credentials and military experience who authorities said had roughly $40 million worth of gold bars stashed in his house was ordered detained pending trial Friday by a federal judge in Virginia. 

David Rush was described by a Justice Department prosecutor as a “master manipulator” who “cannot be trusted” — detailing a damning track record of lies that the government says only grows by the day as the FBI and intelligence community continue their investigation. 

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

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(NEW YORK) — The Coast Guard has taken custody of the Hookers’ dinghy amid the new search for Lynette Hooker, an American woman who went overboard in the Bahamas and vanished two months ago.

The Coast Guard is using divers, underwater drones and a K9 as it explores new areas not previously searched.

This week’s search comes after forensic evidence found on electronic devices belonging to Lynette Hooker’s husband, Brian Hooker, led investigators to new areas of interest, U.S. officials said. One U.S. official told ABC News that what Brian Hooker told investigators does not match the GPS data recovered from his devices.

Lynette Hooker went missing on the evening of April 4. Brian Hooker told authorities that after the couple departed Hope Town on their dinghy to head to their yacht, bad weather caused her to go overboard.

Brian Hooker was arrested on April 8 and questioned by police. He was released on April 13 without charges.

Lynette Hooker’s daughter and Brian Hooker’s stepdaughter, Karli Aylesworth, told ABC News she doubts Brian Hooker’s story and said she’s not spoken with him since the day after her mother went missing.

Aylesworth said this week she’s hopeful the new search points investigators in the right direction.

“She has to be somewhere, so all the help that we could get, it’s greatly appreciated,” she said.

Aylesworth said if she could speak to her mother now, she’d tell her, “I just hope you’re still out there. I have doubts with how long it’s been, but I love you and I hope I can see you again.”

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(NEW YORK) — The Colorado Court of Appeals reversed the convictions of two former Aurora paramedics, who were convicted in December 2023 of criminally negligent homicide in the 2019 death of Elijah McClain, a 23-year-old unarmed Black man who was walking home from a convenience store.

In reversing the convictions, the judge ruled on Thursday that the case should be sent back to the district court for a possible retrial.

McClain’s case gained national attention, particularly in the wake of the May 2020 killing of George Floyd, becoming one of the prominent cases that fueled Black Lives Matter protests across the country.

Sheneen McClain, Elijah McClain’s mother, reacted to the reversal of the convictions in a post on social media on Thursday, calling the move “corrupt and cowardly.”

“I am not surprised by the denial of true justice for American citizens in the hands of government branches who allow criminal behaviors in their police agencies,” she wrote. “They are corrupt and cowardly.”

ABC News has reached out to attorneys for the paramedics, Peter Cichuniec and Jeremy Cooper, for comment.

Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser told ABC News in a statement that his office stands by its decision to charge the paramedics and “is committed to defending these convictions through the appeals. Justice demands it.”

ABC News reached out to Weiser’s office for further comment.

The charges

Cichuniec and Cooper were accused of administering an excessive amount of ketamine to sedate McClain after an encounter with police on Aug. 24, 2019.

Cichuniec and Cooper were found guilty of criminally negligent homicide on Dec. 23, 2023. Cichuniec was also convicted of assault in the second-degree via the unlawful administration of drugs. Cooper was acquitted of the assault charge in 2023, and they both pleaded not guilty at trial.

The appeals court ruling upheld Cichuniec’s assault conviction, but reversed the negligent homicide conviction.

Cooper was sentenced in 2024 to a four-year probationary sentence for negligent homicide. Meanwhile, Cichuniec was sentenced to five years in prison with a three-year period of parole for the assault charge and one year to be served concurrently on the negligent homicide charge.

Cichuniec and Cooper separately appealed their convictions.

In Thursday’s ruling, the appeals court agreed with Cooper’s defense team that the lower court “misled” jurors by failing to clarify the standard of care applicable to the charge of criminally negligent homicide after jurors asked the court for a definition.

“By telling the jurors to apply the ‘common and ordinary meanings’ of the words in the instruction, the court failed to shine any light on the issue and in fact misled the jurors as to the applicable standard of care: The proper standard wasn’t that of a generic reasonable person but of a person in Cooper’s profession under the existing circumstances,” the ruling reads.

The judge ruled that the reversal of Cooper’s conviction also applies to Cichuniec because they were both tried together in that case.

“The two were tried on identical theories of guilt and the evidence against them was, while not identical, sufficiently similar that we can’t conclude that the errors were harmless as to Cichuniec,” the ruling says.

What happened to Elijah McClain?

McClain was confronted by police while walking home from a convenience store after a 911 caller told authorities they had seen someone “sketchy” in the area.

McClain was unarmed and wearing a ski mask at the time. His family says he had anemia, a blood condition that can make people feel cold more easily.

When officers arrived on the scene, they told McClain they had a right to stop him because he was “being suspicious.”

In police body camera footage, McClain can be heard telling police he was going home, and that “I have a right to go where I am going.”

Officer Nathan Woodyard placed McClain in a carotid, or choke, hold and he and the other two officers on the scene moved McClain by force to the grass and restrained him.

When Cooper and Cichuniec arrived, McClain was given a shot of 500 milligrams of ketamine to sedate him and he was loaded into an ambulance where he had a heart attack, according to investigators.

McClain died on Aug. 30, 2019, three days after doctors pronounced him brain dead and he was removed from life support, officials said.

Former police officer Randy Roedema was found guilty of criminally negligent homicide and assault in the third degree in McClain’s death. He was sentenced to more than one year in the county jail in January.

Two other officers, Jason Rosenblatt and Woodyard, were found not guilty on charges of reckless manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide. Rosenblatt was also acquitted on charges of assault in the second degree.

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(Canton, Mass.) — Karen Read has filed a lawsuit against Massachusetts State Police and the Canton Police Department nearly a year after she was acquitted of killing her police officer boyfriend.

Prosecutors had accused Read of fatally hitting John O’Keefe with her car outside of another officer’s home and leaving him to die in a blizzard in January 2022, to which she pleaded not guilty.

Her first trial ended in a hung jury. In her second trial she was found not guilty of the most serious charges, including second-degree murder, manslaughter and leaving the scene after an accident resulting in death.

The jury did find her guilty of operating under the influence of liquor. The judge immediately sentenced her to one-year probation, the standard for a first-time offense.

In the lawsuit filed Thursday, Read claims she was “wrongfully prosecuted” for the death of O’Keefe — a Boston Police officer — costing her employment and leading to reputational damages, millions of dollars in legal expenses and serious emotional and physical distress and injury.

In the lawsuit, Read alleges that two former officers assigned to the case, former Massachusetts Police Officer Michael Proctor and former Canton Police Officer Sean Goode, were “misogynist bigots” who led a “conflicted and corrupt ‘investigation'” into the death of O’Keefe.

The suit listed some of the text messages found on Proctor and Goode’s phones with sexist and racist remarks that came under scrutiny during the course of Read’s criminal trials.

Proctor previously said he developed strong negative feelings about Read “as the case went on,” in an interview with ABC News. He said he “shouldn’t have” expressed his emotions in that way and should not have texted his friends about the case, calling the texts “regrettable.”

In a statement Friday, an attorney for Proctor pushed back against Read’s claims and maintained that there is “overwhelming” evidence that Read killed O’Keefe by “backing up and striking him” with her vehicle while “highly intoxicated.”

“The focus on anything other than Ms. Read’s own conduct on the night Officer O’Keefe was killed is as telling as it is predictable. Events in Mr. Proctor’s personal life have been reviewed, ad nauseum, by a grand jury, the District Attorney and the Massachusetts State Police,” Matthew Hamel, Proctor’s attorney in the Karen Read case, told ABC News in a statement.

“It is a matter of undisputed fact that anything Mr. Proctor did or said in his personal life, years before Officer O’Keefe was killed, had no bearing whatsoever on the investigation of Karen Read,” Hamel said.

In a statement Thursday, Massachusetts Police said Proctor’s comments are “not tolerated within our ranks.”

“These disturbing messages are entirely inconsistent with any basic standard of decency and certainly with the expectations of a Massachusetts State Trooper. These racist, sexist and abhorrent comments absolutely do not reflect the values of the Massachusetts State Police and are not tolerated within our ranks. They underscore and fully support my decision to terminate Michael Proctor,” Massachusetts State Police Col. Geoffrey Noble said in a statement to ABC News.

Noble also recognized that “this misconduct harmed the public trust on which our mission depends.”

An attorney for Proctor did not immediately respond to ABC News’ request for comment Thursday. Attorney information for Goode was not immediately available Thursday.

The Town of Canton said in a statement Thursday it “learned of a lawsuit filed by Karen Read from the news media and via a press release issued by Read’s legal team. Town Counsel had previously attempted to communicate with Read’s legal team as to the status of her claim, but received no response at the conclusion of the notice period.”

“The Town has not been served, and as such we have nothing to review with legal counsel at this time,” the statement added.

The statement went on to say, “The Town of Canton has the utmost faith and confidence in the new leadership of Canton Police Department under Chief Michael Daniels, and we would refute any broad stroke characterizations about the brave and dedicated men and women who serve in the Department. The Department has made significant strides forward over the past two years, including the acceptance and implementation of findings and recommendations in the outside audit report.”

Read’s suit alleges that the officers began “targeting and framing the female outsider, Ms. Read” after the owners of the house where O’Keefe was found in the front lawn “falsely” told police he never entered the house.

In a statement to ABC News in 2023, the prosecutors said, “There was no conspiracy or coverup. Such claims have been systematically refuted by evidence submitted to Norfolk Superior Court.”

Proctor denied fabricating evidence in the June 2025 interview with ABC News, saying “there is no evidence of it.”

Goode said during his testimony at the trial that he stood by his investigation in the case.

In the lawsuit, Read alleges that O’Keefe had gone into the house of fellow cops and friends Brian and Nicole Albert and claimed that there were signs of dog bites and scratches on his arm and a laceration on his head that “could have only come from a backwards fall on a ridged surface in the house.”

The prosecution said in its statement to ABC News that, according to O’Keefe’s cellphone GPS records and 11 witness statements, O’Keefe never entered Albert’s home. The medical examiner found “no signs of Mr. O’Keefe being involved in any type of physical altercation or fight.”

The Alberts previously said in a statement after Read’s acquittal that they “mourn with John’s family and lament the cruel reality that this prosecution was infected by lies and conspiracy theories spread by Karen Read, her defense team, and some in the media.”

“Today, our hearts are with John and the entire O’Keefe family. They have suffered through so much and deserved better from our justice system,” the statement at the time said.

Read’s suit alleges that Proctor and Goode’s investigative approach was born out of “singling out and vilifying an outsider while protecting the ‘blue line’ and their families.”

Goode resigned this week while on paid administrative leave from the Canton Police Department amid an outside investigation into alleged misconduct, the Boston Herald reported. The resignation does not alter the completion of the investigation and the results will still be submitted to the town and the Peace Officer Standards and Training Commission, the town of Canton told ABC Boston affiliate WCVB.

Read’s suit criticizes police for not searching the home where O’Keefe was found for blood, fingerprints or DNA evidence. Police only entered the “crime scene house” a week later, according to the suit.

Prosecutors said that evidence shows O’Keefe never entered the home and was not murdered by anyone inside the residence, alleging his injuries were sustained by Read hitting him with her car. Prosecutors insisted that those gathering inside the house had no idea O’Keefe was outside until he was discovered the next morning.

Read is asking the court for a ruling against Massachusetts State Police and Canton Police, an unspecified amount of damages to be calculated at trial and attorney’s fees.

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(HAMMOND,  La.) — An innocent woman was killed when gunmen fired 70 to 80 bullets into a car at a Louisiana gas station, apparently believing that their target was in the car, according to police.

Hammond police said the gunmen’s alleged target had been in the car before the shooting, but not at the time of the shooting.

Before the gunfire erupted early Thursday, the suspects were stalking a car at a farm, Hammond Police Chief Edwin Bergeron Jr. said at a news conference.

“At some point [the alleged target] was in the vehicle, and then exited the vehicle to ride with someone else,” Bergeron said.

The victim’s car then left the farm and went to a Chevron gas station, the chief said, and the suspects followed.

When the driver of the victim’s car got out and went inside the gas station, the suspects’ car “pulled up next to it … and began shooting,” Bergeron said.

The suspects fired between 70 and 80 shots, taking the life of 50-year-old Patricia Shepard, who was sitting in the car, Bergeron said.

She was an “absolute innocent victim,” the chief said. “She was not involved.”

Bergeron said investigators are searching for at least two or three suspects.

“We will not rest until the scumbags like this go to jail … for them to roll up and kill an innocent woman in a car because they thought it was somebody else,” he said.

The suspects were driving a car that was stolen in Mississippi earlier in the week, police said.

Authorities urge anyone with information to call the Hammond Police Department at 985-277-5755 or the Crime Stoppers anonymous tip line at 1-800-554-5245.

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(NEW YORK) — A Virginia man found guilty of killing his wife and a stranger lured to their home in an elaborate plot to get rid of his spouse so he could be with his au pair is set to be sentenced on Friday.

Brendan Banfield was convicted in the 2023 murders of his wife and a man prosecutors said he “catfished” on a fetish website. Prosecutors said Brendan Banfield pretended to be his wife to lure the man to their Fairfax County home for what was believed to be a consensual fake rape scenario in order to frame that stranger for his wife’s murder.

A jury found him guilty of two counts of aggravated murder in February. He faces a life sentence without the possibility of parole.

The former IRS agent was charged with two counts of aggravated murder in 2024 following a monthslong investigation into the deaths of his wife, 37-year-old nurse Christine Banfield, and the stranger, 39-year-old Joseph Ryan.

Prosecutors said Brendan Banfield plotted the murders with the family’s au pair, Juliana Peres Magalhães, with whom he was having an affair.

Police responded to a 911 call from the home in Reston on Feb. 24, 2023, and found Ryan dead in an upstairs bedroom with gunshot wounds to his head and chest. Christine Banfield had been stabbed seven times in the neck, prosecutors said.

At the time, Magalhães and Banfield told police they came home to find Ryan stabbing Christine Banfield to death. Banfield and Magalhães each shot Ryan, they said in their 911 call and to responding officers at the scene.  

Magalhães was arrested first and initially charged with second-degree murder for the death of Ryan. She pleaded guilty to manslaughter in 2024 and was sentenced to 10 years in prison, the maximum, in February. Prosecutors said she admitted to shooting Ryan at Brendan Banfield’s direction.

Brendan Banfield was arrested several months after Magalhães and charged with two counts of aggravated murder for the deaths of his wife and Ryan.

Prosecutors said Brendan Banfield stabbed his wife with a kitchen knife that Ryan had been instructed to bring, and, before calling 911, altered the crime scene to make it look as though Ryan stabbed her — including by transferring some of his wife’s blood onto Ryan’s hands.

Magalhães testified against Brendan Banfield during his trial, telling the court that he expressed his desire to “get rid of” his wife in October 2022. She said he told her he wanted to marry her and have children with her, and that he didn’t want to divorce his wife because “she would have more money than he would” and because he wanted custody of the couple’s daughter.

She prayed for forgiveness from the victims’ families during her sentencing hearing.

“There is nothing I could possibly do to make it up to you, for your loss. There are so many regrets, this is my biggest. It’s a tragedy I have been carrying with me, and I know I can never take back the devastation of what I have done,” she said.

Following Magalhães’ sentencing, Fairfax County Commonwealth’s Attorney Steve Descano said the au pair’s testimony was “invaluable in helping the jury understand the convoluted double-murder plot orchestrated by Brendan Banfield.”

During his three-week-long trial, Brendan Banfield testified in his own defense. He admitted to the affair though maintained his innocence.

He said he came home on Feb. 24, 2023, after the au pair called to alert him about a stranger in the home. He said he went up to his bedroom with his gun drawn and found his wife naked with Ryan and that she called out, “Brendan, he has a knife!”

“I was extremely terrified,” Brendan Banfield told the jury. “I don’t think I’ve ever been more panicked in my life.”

He said he fired his government-issued firearm, striking Ryan in the head, after he said the man appeared to stab his wife.

The couple’s then-4-year-old daughter was in the basement of the house at the time of the killings. Brendan Banfield was additionally found guilty of child endangerment, as well as using a firearm while committing or attempting to commit murder.

ABC News’ Sophie Sonnenfeld contributed to this report.

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(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump’s plans to build a White House ballroom are in the hands of three appellate judges who will hear oral arguments Friday over whether construction should be allowed to continue.

The panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit will weigh the Trump administration’s request to throw out a lower court judge’s order halting the construction, in a lawsuit brought by historic preservationists.  

U.S. District Judge Richard Leon ruled in late March that Trump has gone beyond his authority in building the ballroom, given that it has not been authorized by Congress. 
Leon’s order was administratively stayed by the appellate panel on April 17, a move that has allowed construction to continue since then.

The Trump administration has argued in court papers that beyond the president’s desire to build a large, permanent event space to host future inaugurations and state dinners, the ballroom — part of a broader “East Wing Modernization Project” — is essential to national security.

The Justice Department points to recent shootings that have occurred in relatively close proximity to the president, including at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner in April and on Pennsylvania Avenue in May, as examples of why the ballroom is needed for security reasons. Both of those incidents had gunmen allegedly exchanging fire with Secret Service police officers.

The government’s filings in the case have described the ballroom project as a fortification of the entire White House complex, saying that with its “deeply ensconced bunker, and its attendant bomb shelters, hospitals, medical facilities, and other National Security functions, to the highly sophisticated Drone Port and Sniper Nests atop the Ballroom, the complex is a highly knitted, unified whole.”

The administration also argues that the group that has sued, the National Trust for Historic Preservation, lacks the standing necessary to bring a case.

Lawyers for the National Trust say that it’s Congress, not the president, that controls the grounds of the White House, and that Leon was correct to determine in his ruling that no statute “comes close” to giving Trump the authority he claims to construct a large edifice next to the executive mansion.

“The public’s interest in its government following the law, and the maintenance of the President’s proper role in our system of separated powers, underscore that the district court did not abuse its discretion,” they write in a brief, urging the appeals court judges to let Judge Leon’s injunction stand.

Prior to beginning consideration this week of an immigration enforcement funding bill, Senate Republicans removed a $1 billion provision, drafted in response to a request from the Secret Service, that officials said a portion of which would have gone toward security-related aspects of the ballroom project.

Arguments in the case will be heard by Obama-appointee Patricia Millett, Trump-appointee Neomi Rao and Biden-appointee Brad Garcia.

ABC News’ Peter Charalambous contributed to this report.

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(MIAMI) — A man, woman and two girls were found stabbed to death in what investigators believe is a murder-suicide in Miami.

Investigators said they believe 42-year-old Ryan Charles Whiten killed 46-year-old Melanie Lauren Hyer, 11-year-old Savannah Whiten and 8-year-old Sienna Whiten before taking his own life, according to the Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office. 

Ryan Charles Whiten was the biological father of Savannah Whiten and Sienna Whiten, and Hyer was the girls’ mother, according to the sheriff’s office. 

Doral Police Officers responded to a residence in Miami-Dade for a welfare check on Tuesday at around 7:30 p.m., according to the sheriff’s office.

Officers entered the residence when they arrived on the scene to find a woman, man and two girls all unresponsive, according to the sheriff’s office. All four individuals suffered stab wounds and were pronounced dead at the scene.

“The Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office Homicide Bureau investigation is currently leading detectives to believe this incident was a murder-suicide. Investigators are continuing to work closely with the Miami-Dade County Medical Examiner’s Office as the investigation remains active,” the sheriff’s office said in a statement. 

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(WASHINGTON) — Senior Justice Department leaders on Thursday announced a number of cases against those who they say perpetrated fraud in Ohio.

Four people, including two state of Ohio employees, were charged with a $30 million fraud scheme targeting the state’s behavioral health department.

Two of the defendants owned businesses which claimed to provide behavioral health services for young adults that attend summer camps, church groups and recreational programs, according to the Justice Department.

The Justice Department alleges the two businesses submitted fraudulent claims for services that were never rendered. After the claims were not submitted because one of the behavioral health organizations’ accreditation was invalid, the two allegedly conspired with another individual to submit claims.

The funds were used to fund a lavish lifestyle, according to DOJ, including purchasing 14 vehicles worth $800,000.

“The days of the brazen theft that we’ve seen of taxpayer dollars, abusing the generosity of the American taxpayer is over,” acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said at a press conference in Columbus, Ohio. “Our message to fraudsters is simple: With our state and local partners, the Department of Justice will be working day and night to identify you, arrest you and imprison you.”

Blanche and other federal leaders, including FBI Director Kash Patel and Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz, were in Ohio to not only announce charges against alleged fraudsters, but to also announce a Top 10 fraudsters list and tout the cooperation between Ohio authorities and the federal government on fraud issues.

“Our best form of information is the American public,” Patel said. “Take a look at this Top 10 most wanted. Let us know any information. There is no bad piece of information. The only bad piece of information is the one you don’t give us.”

Earlier this week, the Justice Department charged five individuals with scamming older Americans in romance fraud schemes totaling $15 million. The five — mostly from Ghana — allegedly used AI to create false stories and indicate to people they were interested in them romantically to get them to send them money.

“Once they establish trust, they use false pretenses and stories about vast inheritances of money, gold, or diamonds, and then convince these elderly Americans to help finance bogus legal proceedings in the nation of Ghana,” U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Ohio David M. Toepfer said at the press conference.

The scheme allegedly went on for almost two years and impacted more than 100 people.

“They then use this stolen money to buy a mansion in Ghana. Diamond-encrusted jewelry, a Lamborghini and other high-end luxury vehicles. All of those assets have now been seized and are going through the forfeiture proceedings so that they will not profit from their fraudulent efforts,” Toepfer said.

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