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By Matthew Russell Lee, Scoop Patreon, thread

SDNY COURTHOUSE, Sept 5 – Michael Hild was arraigned for fraud on Live Well Financial's reverse mortgages and home equipy conversion mortgages by U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York Judge Ronnie Abrams on September 5. It was a routine proceeding except that this alleged white collar criminal was allowed to travel nationwide, seemingly automatically, while other defendants in the SDNY are restricted to the Southern and Eastern Districts of New York.

  The same "travel nationwide" pass was given, for example, the banking fraudster and Manafort lender Stephen Calk. Why this two tier system of justice?

  The trial was set for October 13, 2020; the government described 3 million documents but said that most were from Live Well so Hild had access to them. There is a $500,000 bond, signing for Mrs Laura Hill facilitated from afar unlike so often in the SDNY Magistrates Court. There was joking between the Assistant US Attorney and Hild's lawyer. All among friends, predatory lender with nationwide travel and facilitation of bond signing. The case is US v Hild, 19-cr-602 (RA). A restraining order is supposed to become available, with bank account numbers redacted. Inner City Press will continue to follow this case.

  As if in another world: In reporting on the sometimes depressing litany of young adults jailed in the U.S. Federal courts, with sentences repeated extended by violations of Supervised Release, one hears from time to time of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York's Young Adult Opportunity Program. Inner City Press heard it mentioned on September 3 by SDNY Magistrate Judge Sarah Netburn, that there was an open meeting later in the day.

Nowhere on the SDNY website was the location of the meeting given, but a defense attorney pointed Inner City Press in the right direction, in 40 Foley Square.

  There, Judge Netburn and District Judge Ronnie Abrams, fresh off presiding over what some called the homeless beat-down trial of Sargeant Cordell Fitts, took on roles strikingly different than at sentencings and changes of plea. A baker's dozen of program participants sat in a circle testifying, in the manner of group therapy, about how their month of August had gone.

  For most it was good: a man had apologized to a woman for his behavior, another was making money from his livery cab even while going home to take care of his daughter. A woman had gotten engaged and nearly all were in school. One had been and perhaps will again be a Columbia University teacher's aide, working now at a non-profit.

  The judges gave each of them encouragement, extracting life lessons such as to not hang out with the same old crowd, to not get flumoxed by the ups and downs of income.
 
   After Hild's arraignment on September 5 we have to wonder and ask if the participants are subject to travel restrictions, and if these are SDNY and EDNY unlike the alleged predatory lender's nationwide pass.

  To the two graduating on September 3, good luck was wished. Cases reactivate and it is up to each defendant's lawyer to make a pitch to the Assistant US Attorneys on how to proceed.

Of course there were challenges: a school too far away from home, a month so bad its experiencer asked to speak to the judges in private afteward. (Inner City Press left, and is also not identifying participants in this story). But it was a welcome relief to the drum beat of sentencings and violations of supervised release. There should be more or it.

While many even most cases in the Magistrates Court of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York are sealed or have case numbers given only later, on September 3 Magistrate Judge Sarah Netburn herself expressed concern about unanswered questions about a defendant whose name appeared to be Mr Foreman, a citizen of Guyana and also perhaps of the United States, either living with his mother or not. He is charged with wire fraud and aggrevated identity theft.

Given all these uncertainties, Judge Netburn said no release until conditions met. She also suggested that his appointed lawyer look into the Young Adult Opportunity Program she runs along with SDNY District Judge Ronnie Abrams. Later on September 3, Inner City Press did look into the program, see above. 

Back on August 30 Magistrate Judge Parker was reading out the bond conditions for a defendant called Soto when suddenly the government and Federal Defender Christopher Flood asked for a whispered sidebar.

  There was no court reporter, and Inner City Press the only media in the Mag court could not hear. Suddenly the bail deal was off, and the bond proceeding continued until September 5 in front of Judge Parker. Soto is charged with selling guns, and said he planned to work for Amazon while he said being already employed as a teachers aid. Was this what the whispering was about? Murky mag court indeed.

  Even in the Mag court, case law requires that there be one the record findings about the need to defeat the presumption of press and public access to all facets of such proceedings. Inner City Press will have more on this.

  Earlier in the week affable Judge Parker instructed a defendant named Mr. Patterson who was being released to stay away from the Gun Hill Road area in The Bronx.

The scope of that neighborhood was not defined; his assigned CJA lawyer as we've noted before is at the same time representing the government in a criminal contempt case. Inner City Press will have more on this.

Inner City Press will continue to cover this and other SDNY and 2nd Circuit cases - watch this site, and there is more on Patreon, here.