Chapter 8 - Hunting the Notary
The heavily fabricated documents were the primary key to upgrading the state charges to federal wire fraud and criminal conspiracy. I desperately needed to find the fake notary who had authorized the paperwork. The official seal belonged to a deceased woman, but someone had obviously physically stamped the pages and forged the signatures.
My investigators relentlessly tracked down Marcus’s old college roommate, a disgraced former paralegal named Todd who had lost his license years ago due to embezzlement. We cornered him in a dimly lit dive bar on the rough edge of town. Faced with the immediate threat of federal conspiracy charges and decades in prison, Todd folded instantly, his bravado vanishing in a second.
May you like
“Marcus paid me ten grand in cash to backdate those stamps,” Todd confessed rapidly, sweating profusely and wiping his forehead with a dirty napkin. “He swore to me his mom had severe dementia and it was just a legal technicality to bypass the red tape. I didn't know he was hurting her!”
“You’re going to testify to exactly that under oath in a federal courtroom, Todd,” I said, my tone leaving absolutely no room for negotiation. “Or you can share a tiny concrete cell with him for the rest of your natural life. The choice is yours.”
