Fraud Texas

For hundreds of Mexican women, some here legally and some not, the cardboard stork outside Maria Elena Tafoya's birthing room signals the doorway to a brighter future. Inside, on a small bed with a rubber sheet, under a portrait of the Virgin Mary, their children enter the world on U.S. soil--a minor distinction in geographic terms but one that carries big advantages economically. Tafoya, 57, serves both as midwife and de facto immigration judge, conferring U.S.

A doctor whose alternative cancer treatment sparked a federal inquiry and debate over the use of experimental drugs has been sued for fraud by the family of a patient who died. Mark and Susan Bedient of Lockport, N.Y., are seeking unspecified damages against Dr. Stanislaw Burzynski of Houston in the death of their daughter, Christina, who died of brain cancer at age 10.

A doctor whose alternative cancer treatment sparked a federal inquiry and debate over the use of experimental drugs has been sued for fraud by the family of a patient who died. Mark and Susan Bedient of Lockport, N.Y., are seeking unspecified damages against Dr. Stanislaw Burzynski of Houston in the death of their daughter, Christina, who died of brain cancer at age 10.

Texas separatist Richard McLaren and his followers tried to bilk banks and creditors of $1.8 billion in what they hoped would be "the biggest corporate takeover ever," a federal prosecutor in Dallas charged. McLaren boasted to Republic of Texas members about his plan in a 1996 meeting at his headquarters in the West Texas mountains, prosecutor Mike Uhl said during opening statements in the fraud trial of McLaren and his wife, Evelyn.

The federal agency charged with cleaning up failed thrifts accused a developer funded by Lincoln Savings & Loan of hiding assets to avoid paying a possible judgment or settlement in the government's pending $2.7-billion fraud and racketeering lawsuit. The Resolution Trust Corp. asserts in a new lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Phoenix late Monday, that Emerald Homes Inc.

Texas separatist Richard McLaren and his followers tried to bilk banks and creditors of $1.8 billion in what they hoped would be "the biggest corporate takeover ever," a federal prosecutor in Dallas charged. McLaren boasted to Republic of Texas members about his plan in a 1996 meeting at his headquarters in the West Texas mountains, prosecutor Mike Uhl said during opening statements in the fraud trial of McLaren and his wife, Evelyn.

Sheriff's deputies on Monday arrested three Texans suspected of planning to kidnap a Camarillo man who may know the location of millions of dollars stolen in a federal fraud case. The suspects--two men and a woman--were taken into custody without incident about 9:30 a.m. after deputies located their van and watched them move about the Camarillo area for about an hour, authorities said. Sheriff's Lt.

Texas Atty. Gen. Jim Mattox said Wednesday that the more than 360 confessions of Henry Lee Lucas were a "grand fraud" and that polygraph tests showed the "mass murderer" was a hoaxer who may have killed no more than three people. In releasing a 60-page report after a yearlong investigation, Mattox took law enforcement agencies to task, saying that, in order to clear their books, they had ignored mounting evidence that Lucas was confessing to murders he did not commit.

Five businessmen were charged with financial wrongdoing in connection with a sweeping U.S. Justice Department investigation into fraud among Texas' ailing savings and loan institutions, authorities disclosed. U.S. Atty. Marvin Collins of Dallas called the charges the opening salvo of the case, described as the largest FBI investigation of white collar crime in the Southwest.

Santa Monica-based National Medical Enterprises reported a loss of $54.2 million in the fourth quarter before extraordinary charges, contrasted with a profit of $79.1 million in the same period a year before. The company attributed the poor performance, which was expected, in part to the costs of divesting hospitals in its troubled psychiatric hospital division, where the company has been burdened with the legal costs of fighting charges of insurance fraud in Texas.

For hundreds of Mexican women, some here legally and some not, the cardboard stork outside Maria Elena Tafoya's birthing room signals the doorway to a brighter future. Inside, on a small bed with a rubber sheet, under a portrait of the Virgin Mary, their children enter the world on U.S. soil--a minor distinction in geographic terms but one that carries big advantages economically. Tafoya, 57, serves both as midwife and de facto immigration judge, conferring U.S.

Sheriff's deputies on Monday arrested three Texans suspected of planning to kidnap a Camarillo man who may know the location of millions of dollars stolen in a federal fraud case. The suspects--two men and a woman--were taken into custody without incident about 9:30 a.m. after deputies located their van and watched them move about the Camarillo area for about an hour, authorities said. Sheriff's Lt.

The federal agency charged with cleaning up failed thrifts accused a developer funded by Lincoln Savings & Loan of hiding assets to avoid paying a possible judgment or settlement in the government's pending $2.7-billion fraud and racketeering lawsuit. The Resolution Trust Corp. asserts in a new lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Phoenix late Monday, that Emerald Homes Inc.

Texas Atty. Gen. Jim Mattox said Wednesday that the more than 360 confessions of Henry Lee Lucas were a "grand fraud" and that polygraph tests showed the "mass murderer" was a hoaxer who may have killed no more than three people. In releasing a 60-page report after a yearlong investigation, Mattox took law enforcement agencies to task, saying that, in order to clear their books, they had ignored mounting evidence that Lucas was confessing to murders he did not commit.

A Soviet official said today a contract has been signed to allow an American to travel to the Mir space station, despite a report by the official Soviet news agency that a sweepstakes offering the trip was a hoax. "The Soviet side agreed to it. We signed a letter of intent on Nov. 22," said Vladimir Nikitsky, the deputy director of foreign trade subsidiary of NPO Energia, which negotiates commercial deals for the Soviet space program.

Recently released CIA files from the mid-1960s show Cuban exile and suspected terrorist Luis Posada Carriles informed on violent Miami-based efforts to attack Fidel Castro's fledgling Cuban government even as he was deeply involved in helping them. In the files, the CIA also appeared confident that Posada was a moderate who would not embarrass the agency or the United States. "A15 is not a typical kind of 'boom and bang' individual. He is acutely aware of the international implications of ill-planned or overly enthusiastic activities against Cuba," Posada's CIA handler, Grover T. Lythcott, wrote in a July 26, 1966, memo, using a code name for the Cuban exile.