Sean Kingston and his mother found guilty in $1 million fraud trial
The 35-year-old 'Beautiful Girls' singer, whose real name is Kisean Anderson, and his 62-year-old mother were convicted on all five charges they faced after being arrested in May 2024.
They were found to have used fraudulent documents to obtain over a million dollars worth of luxury cars, jewelry and other items from car dealerships, banks and a mattress company.
According to Local 10 news, Kingston cried as Turner was taken away by US Marshals and told them: 'Protect my mother.'
During the trial, Turner was accused by the judge of being the 'fixer and nerve center' in charge of the fraudulent scheme. She has been convicted of similar crimes in the past, and in 2006 served a year and a half in prison after pleading guilty to stealing over $160,000 via bank fraud.
Meanwhile, Kingston's own defense team described him as a 'child' who did not understand finances and would spend money with no regard for the consequences.
The pair's arrests last May came about after a company named Ver Ver Entertainment LLC brought a civil lawsuit against Kingston that February, seeking damages for breach of contract and fraud.
They alleged at the time that Kingston had purchased a 232-inch Colossal TV and sound system for his home, but failed to pay the $111,000 cost.
Seeking to get out of paying full price, the suit said Kingston had promised to make promotional videos about the company and their products with his friend, Justin Bieber. No commercials were ever made, and Bieber was not involved at any time.
An investigation into the case led authorities to a string of similar crimes. The pair were eventually accused of stealing almost $500,000 in jewelry, more than $200,000 from Bank of America, $160,000 from a car dealer who sold them a bulletproof Cadillac Escalade, more than $100,000 from First Republic Bank and $86,000 from a luxury bed company. All those crimes were alleged to have taken place between October 2023 and March 2024.
Prosecutors said Kingston and Turner, also known as 'Mama Kingston', 'unjustly enriched themselves' by telling companies they had sent out wire transfers when no such payments existed.
Kingston was immediately placed on home detention, but has to meet bond requirements by Thursday, including a $200,000 surety bond in case, plus putting up a relative's $500,000 house.
The pair now face up to 20 years in prison, which is the maximum for federal wire fraud cases. Their sentencing hearings have been set for July 11.
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The Guardian
12 hours ago
- The Guardian
Trump contorting justice department into his ‘personal weapon', experts warn
As Donald Trump's Department of Justice expands investigations of his foes and ousts dozens of lawyers and staff who worked on cases targeting himself and his allies, scholars and ex-prosecutors say the rule of law is under siege in the US as the department morphs into Trump's 'personal weapon'. The justice department's politicization to please Trump was underscored by an announcement on 23 July of a new ' strike force' to investigate unsubstantiated charges that ex-president Barack Obama and top officials conspired to hurt Trump's 2016 campaign and his presidency with inquiries into Russian influence operations to help Trump win, say critics. The announcement came the day after Trump dodged queries from reporters about the justice department's failure to produce long-promised files about the notorious sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, and pivoted to blast Obama without evidence for 'treason'. Trump's conspiratorial charge echoed dubious claims by his national intelligence director, Tulsi Gabbard, who days before called for a justice department inquiry into a purported 'treasonous conspiracy'. Likewise, the FBI earlier in July announced investigations into the ex-FBI director James Comey and ex-CIA director John Brennan, which critics see as political efforts to placate Trump who has often voiced anger at them for their roles in the Russia investigations before and during his first term. Legal scholars and ex-prosecutors say Trump and his loyal attorney general, Pam Bondi, have turned the justice department into his personal law firm to pursue his political and legal agendas. 'It's not unprecedented for presidents to deploy their powers for personal ends, but no one including Nixon has done this with the intensity of Trump,' Peter Shane, who teaches constitutional law at New York University, told the Guardian. Shane added: 'DoJ is now being used as a personal weapon on behalf of Trump to a degree that is without precedent. Trump has a team of sycophants and enablers at DoJ. They're not behaving the way office holders sworn to uphold the constitution are expected to behave. 'The idea that the Obama administration fabricated the story of Russian interference has been refuted multiple times, including by the Senate intelligence committee when, under the chairmanship of then senator Marco Rubio, the committee determined that Russia had indeed launched an aggressive covert effort to interfere in the 2016 election on Trump's behalf.' Other scholars raise similar alarms. 'Trump is using the justice department to target his perceived enemies and pursue his political goals,' said Randall Eliason, a former federal prosecutor who now lectures on law at George Washington University. 'The guiding principle for any DoJ prosecutor has always been loyalty to the constitution and the rule of law. Under this administration, it appears that the primary job requirement for any DoJ prosecutor, up to and including the attorney general, is loyalty to Donald Trump.' The premium that Trump has placed on loyalty at the justice department was revealed early by his choices of Bondi as attorney general, Todd Blanche as deputy attorney general and other senior officials. Bondi, an ex-Florida attorney general, helped defend Trump in the Senate during his first impeachment, and Blanche was his lead counsel in New York where Trump was convicted in 2024 of 34 felony counts for falsifying business records to hide payments during his 2016 campaign to a porn star who alleged an affair with him. The justice department's drive to please Trump was evident in July when Bondi fired about 20 departmental employees. They included support staff and several prosecutors who worked on January 6 cases for special counsel Jack Smith, who charged Trump with improperly retaining hundreds of classified documents after he left office in early 2021, and for engaging in an 'unprecedented criminal effort' to stay in power after his 2020 election loss. Notably, Bondi this month abruptly fired without explanation the department's top ethics official, Joseph Tirrell, and Maureen Comey, a key prosecutor in New York who had worked on charges against Epstein and is James Comey's daughter. Several senior justice department and FBI officials were ousted in the first months of Trump's second presidency. For their part, Trump and Bondi have been blunt about axing lawyers and staff they deem political foes for allegedly politicizing the justice department against Trump. In February, for instance, Trump ordered the department to oust all remaining 'Biden-era' US attorneys, claiming the department 'has been politicized like never before' under Biden. In a similar vein, before taking office Bondi pledged during a confirmation hearing to eliminate what she blasted as 'the partisanship, the weaponization' of the Department of Justice under Biden. Some ex-prosecutors say Trump's charges that he was the victim of justice department weaponization stem from his penchant for conspiratorial thinking. 'The inane claims of weaponization we hear from Trump and his associates are particularly extraordinary because Trump regularly calls for the criminal investigation and prosecution of his political enemies,' said Daniel Richman, a former federal prosecutor who is now a law professor at Columbia University. 'Baseless claims of crimes by his political opponents have always been a staple of Trump's rants. But now that he is president and has picked justice department leaders for their loyalty and not their competence or integrity, the risk of abusive investigations grows.' The justice department's intense focus on targeting Trump critics was evident after Bondi became attorney general when she quickly issued a memo establishing a 'weaponization' working group, say critics. Barbara McQuade, who teaches law at the University of Michigan and used to be a federal prosecutor, said Bondi's memo actually 'weaponizes law enforcement and undermines public confidence in government' because it pushes a 'false narrative' about the two special counsel investigations of Trump. McQuade stressed that 'federal grand juries returned indictments in both cases, meaning that they found probable cause that the crimes were committed.' Other justice department veterans have been appalled at its transformation including the wave of firings. Stacey Young, who spent 18 years as a federal litigator at the Department of Justice before leaving voluntarily in January, launched the group Justice Connection to help remaining justice department employees deal with ethical and legal headaches and find jobs for those who want to leave. 'These unprecedented firings at the justice department are growing exponentially,' Young told the Guardian. ' They happen with no notice and no opportunity to be heard, in violation of the Civil Service Reform Act and due process. Many people, and even their supervisors, have no idea why the firings targeted them or why now. Employees now wake up each day wondering if they're going to be next. 'It's screwing with people's lives, and it's also creating a culture of fear among the entire workforce. DoJ leadership is making clear the ability to keep your job is not tied to your performance, your expertise, or your commitment to uphold and defend the constitution.' On 24 July, three justice department officials including Tirrell who were abruptly fired this summer, filed a lawsuit against Bondi seeking reinstatement and back pay arguing that they were axed improperly and without cause. Other ex-federal prosecutors say the department is now being weaponized to please Trump. 'There is literally no reason to fire these people, other than to continue molding the department into Trump's personal law firm,' Mike Romano, an ex-justice department prosecutor who left voluntarily in March after almost four years working on prosecutions of Trump allies who stormed the Capitol on 6 January 2021. 'Trump and Bondi are bringing us back to the spoils system, where the government is not staffed by merit but based on favors, and is not staffed with experts, but with hacks and cronies. As a country, we decided almost 150 years ago that the spoils system is terrible and corrupt.' Further, Bondi and Trump have stepped up attacks on judges who have rebuked justice department lawyers for presenting arguments in court that were specious or failed to respond to judges' queries, several of which have involved the administration's hardline anti-immigrant actions, say critics. 'There are certain things lawyers should avoid doing because they are sure to pique the ire of federal judges,' said ex-federal judge John Jones, who is president of Dickinson College. 'These include patronizing, temporizing, lying and making baseless arguments. The Trump DoJ lawyers have hit them all before multiple judges.' Likewise, Emil Bove III, a key Trump defense lawyer in 2024 who was the justice department's number three for several months before Trump nominated him as a federal appeals court judge that the Senate recently approved, was cited in one whistleblower complaint for telling department lawyers they could flout court orders to further Trump's immigration agenda. More broadly, scholars and justice department veterans see the Trump administration breaking sharply with historical norms and rewriting history to burnish Trump's image. 'The firing of the January 6 prosecutors and the pardons of the Capitol rioters are all part of an effort to whitewash what happened on January 6,' said Eliason. 'The goal is to portray the rioters as the true victims and falsely suggest that the law enforcement professionals who pursued these cases did something wrong. 'A key foundation of our constitutional system is adherence to the rule of law and the independence of the justice system from politics. That's all being discarded by the Trump administration.' Shane likewise stressed: 'Trump has placed his own lawyers in key justice department positions, expecting them to continue thinking of themselves as personal lawyers for Donald Trump, not government lawyers for the president as an office-holder bound by law.'
-died-inside-a-hot-car-in-Alabama-while-in-the-care-of-state-contract-emplo.jpeg%3Ftrim%3D0%2C0%2C0%2C0%26width%3D1200%26height%3D800%26crop%3D1200%3A800&w=3840&q=100)
The Independent
20 hours ago
- The Independent
Toddler was left to die in hot car while in state custody. Now a state foster care worker is facing charges
The latest headlines from our reporters across the US sent straight to your inbox each weekday Your briefing on the latest headlines from across the US Your briefing on the latest headlines from across the US Email * SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our Privacy notice An Alabama foster care worker is facing up to 20 years in prison after a three-year-old boy in the state's care died in a hot car last month. Kela Stanford, 54, is charged with leaving a child unattended in a motor vehicle in a manner that creates an unreasonable risk of injury or harm, Jefferson County District Attorney Danny Carr said Friday. Ke'Terrious 'KJ' Starkes Jr., a three-year-old from Bessemer, was pronounced dead July 22 after he was found alone in a car at a Birmingham home. Authorities said the car was off and its windows were rolled up when the toddler was found, KTLA reported. The child was in the foster care system and had been picked up from daycare by Stanford, a contract employee of the State Department of Human Resources, for a scheduled visit with his father, NBC News reported. He was supposed to be taken back to daycare after the visit but ended up at the suspect's home, where he was left inside the car, police said. The child was discovered after his foster mother arrived at daycare to collect him, and discovered he wasn't there. open image in gallery Kela Stanford was charged with leaving a child unattended in a motor vehicle in a manner that creates an unreasonable risk of injury or harm ( Jefferson County Jail ) The toddler was in the car for about five hours before he was found, the Jefferson County Coroner's Office said. Stanford had regularly driven the toddler to and from scheduled supervised visits, and it was not immediately clear what caused the child to be left in the car. Stanford was taken in for questioning and was cooperative, police said. The boy's biological father, who has not been identified, told WBRC that he last saw his son that morning. 'Words can't even express how I feel right now,' he told the outlet, through tears. 'As soon as I leave my son, the first thing he says is, 'Daddy, I want to go with you.' He says that every time, and it really hurts.' open image in gallery Ke'Torrius 'KJ' Starkes, 3, died inside a hot car in Alabama last month ( ) The grieving father said that he usually handed over his son to a representative from a private child welfare provider, who was responsible for transporting his son to and from daycare. 'A child in DHR custody was being transported by a contract provider when the incident occurred,' a DHR spokesperson said. 'The provider has terminated their employee. Due to confidentiality, DHR cannot comment further regarding the identity of the child or the exact circumstances.' Stanford was booked into the Jefferson County Jail Friday and has been released on bond. If convicted, she faces between two and 20 years in prison.
The Sun
20 hours ago
- The Sun
I hunted down my dad's ISIS killers & stared evil jihadi brides in the eye – one smirking monster still haunts my dreams
WHEN a grizzly video of her father being brutally beheaded by IS terrorists was broadcast to the world, Bethany Haines made it her life's mission to get answers. Brave Bethany, whose aid worker dad David was publicly murdered in 2013, dedicated her life to confronting the monsters who played a part in his torture, captivity and death. 14 In an exclusive interview she reveals how she has travelled the world to confront ISIS's most evil men and women. Bethany tells how she had a two-and-a-half-hour showdown with one of her dad's evil torturers, gave the middle finger to one of IS's most dangerous men in Paris after he glared at her throughout a six-week trial and even travelled to Syria to meet IS brides who acted as recruiters for the terror group. She became obsessed with getting answers about her dad's final months and gained a unique insight into each evil members' psyche. Speaking to The Sun for our Meeting a Monster series, mum-of-one Bethany, 27, said: 'I have met some of the most evil people imaginable. I've been to France, Syria and the US on numerous occasions to understand why they did what they did to my dad. 'Every meeting takes a piece of me away but I can't stop trying to find out answers as to why they did that to my father. 'After every meeting I have had to rebuild, and it takes me months. 'But I know that if my dad was here he would be doing the same, going to every court case, taking up every opportunity to meet anyone connected to the murder and showing them but they're not going to get away with that evil.' Today Bethany recalls the chilling meetings with two of her father's IS captors. Bethany reveals how Brit terrorist Alexander Kotey tried to goad her as she pressed him for answers in a terrifying one-on-one meeting while fellow IS member El Shafee Elsheikh snarled at her as she called out his abhorrent treatment of her father. But she says one terror attack mastermind "was the worst kind of monster that you can imagine hiding under your bed,' and left her haunted by "the deadest eyes I've ever seen". Hamas vows no peace unless key demand is met as thugs share sick clip of hostage David, 44, from Perth, was abducted while working at a refugee camp in Syria in 2013. He was held hostage by West London-raised quartet Elsheikh, Kotey, Mohammed Emwazi and Aine Davis – nicknamed The Beatles. In 2014, a video of gaunt and pale David, wearing an orange jumpsuit and kneeling next to knife-wielding British-born Emwazi - dubbed Jihadi John - horrified the world. It ended with his beheading - one of 27 the group are believed to have carried out. Emwazi died in a drone strike in Syria in 2015 while Davis, 38, was captured in Turkey in 2017 and sentenced to seven and a half years for being a member of a terrorist organisation. In 2022, Elsheikh was found guilty of hostage taking and conspiring to murder after a two-week trial in the US, while Kotey pleaded guilty to terror charges and was sentenced to life in prison. One of the conditions of Kotey's sentence was that he had to meet the loved ones of those he tormented. 'You can't inherit an apology' 14 14 14 Bethany, who is from Perthshire, flew back to the US for the showdown with Kotey, who was being held at a super-max jail and was transported to a high-security Virginia justice building for the meeting. Bethany said: 'I was very nervous. I was about to sit opposite and look into the eyes of the man who had done so much harm to my dad. I needed answers. I needed an apology but what I got was a game from Kotey. "When I got in the room, he was so relaxed, like nothing had happened. It was like chatting with someone in a café not someone who had tormented your dad. He doodled and drew spirals with a pen as I talked to him. 'He acted like it was a game. He told me things I didn't know. He said my dad was abducted after he spotted him outside a kebab house. "He said they took dad to hospital dressed as an IS fighter as he had become very ill and he blamed the other terrorists for driving the violence and torture. I took it all with a pinch of salt. 'He told me that before his beheading my dad accepted his fate and smiled. He wanted a reaction from me. He said my dad said to Mohammed Emwazi, the terrorist who beheaded him, 'make it quick'. "I could see that he was trying to make me uncomfortable and get a rise out of me. I asked him if he felt any remorse. He just came back and said, 'you can't inherit an apology'. 'I asked Kotey four times if he was sorry for abducting and torturing my dad and he just skirted around the answer. It was like getting blood out of a stone. He eventually said, 'ok, I'm sorry for kidnapping and hurting your dad'. 'That was all I needed. I told him to 'rot in hell', slammed my notes and folders down in front of him and walked out the room. I didn't want to give him another second. I wanted those words to be the last he heard from me.' 'Look of a little boy' That same year, she flew over to the US to see fellow 'Beatle' – El Shafee Elsheikh - jailed for torturing and holding hostages, including her father, captive. She sat through every day of his trial. She said: 'I made a point of looking at him when speaking to him across the courtroom in my victim impact statement. He had the look of a little boy - someone who had done something naughty rather than being involved in the most evil of beheadings. "When I read my statement, he looked broken to start with, but I told him that there is nothing in the Quran that justifies the violence meted out to my father. I even quoted a passage back to him. I vividly remember that he just looked at me and snarled.' But in February this year, she met the most evil of her father's foes. 'Dark, dead eyes' Bethany had been tormented by the knowledge that other unknown men who had horrifically tortured and enslaved her dad had never been brought to justice. One of them was Mehdi Nemmouche, who had already been convicted of the Brussels Jewish Museum terror attack which killed four in 2014. For six weeks, she sat through every day of his Paris trial in which he was eventually found guilty of kidnapping, acts of torture, and barbarism of seven hostages – including her father - in Syria. 14 She said: 'He was by far the most evil man I've ever met. His dark, dead eyes glared at me across the courtroom. He wanted to intimidate me. "It was the first time I felt fear. He used the courtroom as a stage. You could tell that if he had a chance he would kill everyone in that courtroom. 'He gave off an awful vibe, let any remorse, and smirked and rolled his eyes after every comment that I made to him. 'I sat through every second of his six-week trial. I read a statement to him and was very forceful. He looked into my eyes with his dark pools of deadness and kept smirking. He kept rolling his eyes and glaring over me. He was by far the most evil man I've ever met. His dark, dead eyes glared at me across the courtroom. He wanted to intimidate me Bethany Haines "It was so intense that I constantly wanted to leave the room but didn't want to give him the satisfaction. When he was sentenced to life, I hugged the person next to me, looked him in the eye and laughed. As he was taken down, I gave him the middle finger. 'I'd met lots of evil people that did terrible things to my dad but he haunted my dreams for months after seeing him. I would dream about being at Disneyland with my son and he would just be there. "I would wake up in cold sweats. Being in his presence, took months to get over. I hated him.' Nemmouche has since appealed his conviction – a decision Bethany says is 'insulting'. Terror group's brides And it wasn't just the men of ISIS that Bethany has met - she also travelled to Syria in the wake of the fall of IS in 2019. She went to a camp where she met some of the terror group's brides – some of whom had come from the UK. 14 She said: 'It was a real eye-opener. I met a number of IS brides. One was from Tunisia, one was from Belgium and the other British. One felt like she'd been groomed but I later found out that she'd also been a recruiter to try to get other women over there. "She seemed completely indoctrinated, dead behind the eyes. IS had fallen but she was still defending them. It got me so angry. In some ways I felt a tiny bit of sympathy for some but others I really didn't. "Some stood by IS despite them being eradicated in that area at the time and they couldn't really understand the pain and evil they were bringing to the world.' Bethany added: 'I have really seen close up every facet of the evil that IS has within its groups. It has been truly harrowing.'
