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Abusing trust key trait of con artists

Robert Ruth
Dispatch Staff Reporter

White-collar swindlers can lie with a straight face, their victims say

appeared to have a lot of affec-

Jesse D. Oddi Jr., 51, was accused of tion for him. There were a lot of
taking $448,621 while he was the tears when his theft was re-
Franklin County Clerk of Courts. vealed.''
Jesse D. Oddi Jr., 51, who re-
signed in April 1998 as Franklin
Video - Jesse Oddi Clerk County Common Pleas clerk of
of Courts Goes to Prison courts after being accused of
embezzling $448,621 over 13
years, is another example of a
friendly -- but deceptive --
white-collar criminal. Gary Zeune, CPA
County Prosecutor Ron Managing Director
Daniel Wiant, pleaded guilty to O'Brien, whose office prose- The Pros & The Cons
stealing $7.9 million from the Amer- cuted Oddi, said, "I knew him
614-761-8911
ican Cancer Society of Ohio. for 15 years and never suspected
Email Gary
him of doing anything dishonest
or illegal.
Video - Daniel Wiant "No one suspected him of embezzling, until a couple of inter-
Steals $7+ Million from nal folks became suspicious and expressed those suspicions to
authorities.''
Cancer Society Oddi was sentenced in December 1998 to six years in prison
after pleading guilty to 49 charges.
Gary Zeune, a certified public accountant and anti-fraud con-
sultant from Columbus, is not surprised that Wiant and Oddi
Sometimes their schemes are pennyante and relatively sim- were viewed as trustworthy.
ple; sometimes they are elaborate, even ingenious. "The people you trust are the ones who can steal you blind,''
But whether they're embezzlers, con artists or corrupt public said Zeune, author of The CEO's Complete Guide to Committing
officials, their victims and authorities say white-collar criminals Fraud. Companies and organizations should not allow one per-
usually have one thing in common: They can look their victims son to control disbursements. Checks and balances can reduce
straight in the eye without flinching and lie. the risk of embezzlement, he said.
Daniel S. Wiant, 35, who last month admitted to embezzling Brian Lynch, chief of the white- collar unit of the FBI's
almost $7.9 million from the American Cancer Society of Ohio Columbus office, agreed.
over three years, is a classic example of a friendly, outgoing "They (criminals) have an uncanny ability to talk their way
white-collar criminal. through almost any situation,'' he said. "They look at the con-
For much of his adult life, Wiant smooth-talked his victims cerns of their potential victim and have no problem in promising
into trusting him, then betrayed their trust. them something to take care of those concerns.''
Officials at the Dublin-based society didn't check his criminal James M. Cogley, 53, of Groveport, played on senior citizens'
record when he was hired six years ago as a computer expert. If desire to increase retirement savings for his investment scam. His
they had, the officials would have discovered Wiant was con- sales pitches often included references to his Christianity and to
victed three times -- in 1984, 1986 and 1988 -- for credit-card thousands of dollars he donated to his church. During his sen-
theft. tencing hearing Aug. 9 in U.S. District Court, one victim testified
"We've been so betrayed,'' said Don W. McClure, chief exec- her family and Cogley "would hold hands and pray around the
utive officer of the Ohio division. "The people in his department dinner table.''
 Cogley admitted to defrauding 83 investors out of $3.4 mil-  Mohammad Shamsul Arefin, 33, of Whitehall was an illegal
lion by persuading them to sink money into worthless securities alien from Bangladesh who came up with a scheme to con nine
with promises of high interest rates. New York publishing companies out of $2.2 million worth of
Cogley's victims included his parents-in-law, his sister-in-law textbooks. Using 11 aliases, Arefin posed as an official from sev-
and a nephew. He was sentenced to four years, nine months in eral educational organizations in Columbus and other Ohio
prison. cities. He ordered the books on credit, a common practice in the
People who are taken in by con artists should not feel foolish, industry. He then sold the books to distributors at deep discounts
Lynch said. "It could happen to anyone from any walk of life.'' and never paid the publishers.
Victims of central Ohio white-collar criminals in recent years In April 1999, he was sentenced to three years, 11 months in
have included a former member of Mayor Greg Lashutka's cabi- prison.
net, a former member of the Ohio House of Representatives, a  Like Cogley, Richard J. Parris, 54, used religion to reel in
retired architect, clergymen, a lawyer, bank officers and book many victims. Dubbed the Elmer Gantry of tax consultants, Par-
publishers. ris targeted hundreds of middle-income Christian families in cen-
The criminals have run the gamut of professions, including a tral Ohio with promises of huge tax savings. But Parris' advice
millionaire real-estate mogul, a bank president and a lawyer. was false, federal court jurors found in May 1998. They con-
White-collar crimes include tax evasion, counterfeiting, em- victed him of 14 fraud-related charges, and he was sentenced in
bezzlement and bribery. Frauds involving wire transfers, mail, June 1999 to six years in prison. To their dismay, many of Parris'
insurance, bankruptcy and credit cards also are considered white- victims discovered they owed the Internal Revenue Service hun-
collar crimes. dreds of dollars in delinquent taxes, interest and penalties.
Many of these offenses are prosecuted in federal court in  Michael Hurwitz, 53, a former owner of a Short North
Columbus. gallery, tricked investors -- many of them friends -- into loaning
During the past two years, 34 percent of the 596 defendants him money to buy supposedly rare documents. Hurwitz told his
charged in U.S. District Court have been accused of white-collar victims that the documents included a World War II surrender
crimes. In the first eight months of this year, 27 percent of the document signed by the Japanese high command and presidential
181 defendants in federal court have been accused of such signatures. The merchandise proved to be fake.
crimes. In June 1998, Hurwitz was sentenced to three years behind bars.
Other high-profile central Ohio cases in recent years have in- Victims of his scheme included former state Rep. E.J. Thomas;
cluded: former local TV celebrity Jerry Beck; and George Arnold, for-
 Albert DeSantis, 57, once a millionaire real-estate developer mer director of the Columbus Trade and Development Depart-
in the Ohio State University area, is serving a 4 1/2 -year prison ment.
sentence after being convicted last year in two cases. DeSantis
swindled $1.6 million from investors in the central Ohio and
Akron areas and followed this up with trying to hide almost $1 Gary Zeune, CPA is the Managing Director of The Pros & The
million in assets when filing for bankruptcy. Cons, the only speakers bureau in the U.S. for white collar crimi-
 Lorraine T. Furtado, 64, a lawyer from Columbus, stole the nals. He is a nationally recognized speaker and writing on fraud
identity of a childhood friend in Haywood, Calif. Posing as the and ethics. Zeune and his 40+ speakers provide more than 300
friend, Furtado obtained six credit cards and purchased $23,144 fraud and ethics seminar, conference and online presentations
worth of merchandise. After pleading guilty in October 1999,
every year. CON speakers:
Furtado was sentenced to 11 months in prison and permanently
 Fraud, theft, corruption, kickback, cooking the books
gave up her license to practice law in Ohio.
 Carl E. Wiley Jr., 44, led a counterfeit check-cashing ring un-  $18,000 to $2.7 billion
der the noses of prison officials. For three years, Wiley issued or-  Bookkeeper to CEO
ders to 11 other ring members over the phone and through his  High school to PhD
mother while he was serving time in state prison. The ring
cashed more than $730,000 in counterfeit checks at banks [email protected]
throughout central Ohio. Wiley was sentenced in May 1999 to
five years, four months in federal prison.
 Barbara A. Markin, 54, was named the Small Business Person
of the Year in 1995 by the Greater Columbus Chamber of Com-
merce. The outgoing entrepreneur talked Huntington National
Bank officials into loaning her marketing companies almost $11
million. But she spent much of the bank's money on personal ex-
penses like a mansion in New Albany, fur coats, luxury cards
and jewelry. In 1998, she was charged with falsifying business
records in order to get the loans. At her sentencing hearing in
July 1999, Michael Higbee, a Huntington vice president, said
Markin had cost several bank officers and hundreds of her full-
and part-time employees their jobs. She is serving a five-year
prison term.