Former Gallia County 911 dispatcher and administrator at the Greenfield Township Volunteer Fire Department charged federally for 24 arson fires in Wayne National Forest said he started the fires “to give the boys something to do,”
COLUMBUS, Ohio – A fire department administrator and former 911 dispatcher has been charged federally with crimes related to at least 24 arson fires since spring 2022 in Wayne National Forest.
James A. Bartels, 50, of Patriot, Ohio, was arrested yesterday and appeared in federal court in Columbus.
Bartels is an administrator at the Greenfield Township Volunteer Fire Department. He also served as a 911 dispatcher for Gallia County.
According to an affidavit filed in support of a criminal complaint, Ohio Department of Natural Resources law enforcement officers observed a truck registered to Bartels near Wayne National Forest on Oct. 29, 2022. Bartels was observed on Dry Ridge Road. Within an hour, a fire was reported in the forest near Dry Ridge Road and Cauley Creek Road.
In the days after Bartels’s Nov. 8 resignation from working as a 911 dispatcher for Gallia County, at least 17 fires were lit. Bartels was seen at two separate locations in the vicinity of multiple fire starts within minutes of their ignition.
The affidavit details that in a law enforcement interview, Bartels admitted to starting the fires with a lighter to “give the boys something to do” and to distract himself from depression. He identified 24 arson fires for which he was responsible. His truck’s infotainment system data also placed him at the locations of the fires.
Bartels is schedule for a preliminary hearing in U.S. District Court on Jan. 3, 2023, in Columbus.
Willfully committing arson is a federal crime punishable by up to five years in prison.
Kenneth L. Parker, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio, and the U.S. Forest Service announced the charges. Assistant United States Attorneys Michael J. Hunter is representing the United States in this case.
A criminal complaint merely contains allegations, and defendants are presumed innocent unless proven guilty in a court of law.
CINCINNATI – A Miami, Florida, man was sentenced to 72 months in prison for conspiring in a racketeering enterprise to defraud individuals through moving companies located throughout the United States. Identified victims of the fraud lost more than $2.4 million total.
Serghei Verlan, 39, was sentenced in U.S. District Court in Cincinnati today.
The criminal enterprise used a series of moving companies to exploit thousands of people across the country by demanding ransom for the personal possessions those people had entrusted the enterprise to transport.
Verlan was one of 12 defendants indicted in July 2018 and was one of two leaders of the conspiracy. According to court documents, the defendants operated and worked through at least 12 affiliated moving companies to enrich themselves by defrauding customers who hired them to move their household goods.
The enterprise executed their scheme through various moving companies in Florida, Ohio, Maryland, North Carolina, Illinois, Texas, California, Connecticut, Colorado and Missouri. More than 1,000 customers have been identified as victims.
One of the enterprise’s warehouses was in West Chester, Ohio, and some of the identified victims reside in the Southern District of Ohio.
As part of the conspiracy, the defendants would provide customers with low binding estimates to do their move, promising to beat their competitor’s prices. After the customers agreed to hire the moving companies, employees of the moving companies would load the customers’ goods onto the truck and then the price of the move would be bumped. Co-conspirators would use an inflated cubic footage for the price of moving the customers’ goods.
Verlan was one of the few defendants who knew the “actual” or “real” cubic footage for customers’ goods and instructed workers to charge customers based on the fraudulently inflated price. He told employees to cap the overcharge at 20 percent to keep customer complaints down.
Verlan also paid employees to write fake positive reviews of their various companies to manage their online image. He was also directly responsible for furthering the conspiracy by “reincarnating” affiliated companies into “new” companies controlled by the enterprise through false statements to federal regulators.
Verlan pleaded guilty in August 2022 to participating in the racketeering conspiracy.
The other leader of the conspiracy, Andrey Shuklin, 34, of Miami, Florida, was sentenced in U.S. District Court in May to 78 months in prison.
Kenneth L. Parker, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio; Andrea M. Knopf, Regional Special Agent-in-Charge, Office of Inspector General, U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT); and J. William Rivers, Special Agent in Charge, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Cincinnati Division, announced the sentence imposed today by U.S. District Judge Douglas R. Cole. Assistant United States Attorneys Megan Gaffney Painter and Matthew C. Singer are representing the United States in this case.
(COLUMBUS, Ohio) — Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost applauds the recent passage of legislation that codifies the Tenth Amendment Center in the Ohio Solicitor General’s Office.
“The principle of federalism – the idea that power is shared among multiple levels of government instead of concentrated into a single level – is indelibly etched into the foundation of our nation through the Tenth Amendment,” Yost said. “Thank you to Rep. Jeff LaRe and Rep. Adam Bird for helping us to codify this crucial function in our office.”
House Bill 506 adds the Tenth Amendment Center to Ohio law, tasking it with actively monitoring federal executive orders, as well as statutes and regulations for potential abuse or overreach. If the Tenth Amendment Center identifies an issue, it will report it to the solicitor general – also codified in this bill – who then advises the attorney general about possible state involvement. The state solicitor general currently represents the state and its agencies on appeals in the U.S. Supreme Court, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, the Ohio Supreme Court, and other state and federal courts.
Before the 134th General Assembly recently ended, HB 506 was approved by the House and amended into Senate Bill 288, a criminal justice omnibus measure. Sen. Nathan Manning (R-North Ridgeville) sponsored the Senate measure.
Rep. LaRe (R-Violet Twp.) said monitoring for federal overreach “has become a laborious job in and of itself.”
“Federalism is a foundational piece of our U.S. Constitution,” he said. “That is why, as a member of state government, I must do what I can to protect the rights that were reserved for us under the Tenth Amendment. I am appreciative of the General Assembly’s support for HB 506, and look forward to it being signed into law in the near future.”
The legislation awaits Gov. Mike DeWine’s signature.
(COLUMBUS, Ohio) – Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost praises the recently ended 134th General Assembly for its near-unanimous approval of legislation that increases the penalty for disrupting a lawful meeting.
House Bill 504, called the Sacred Spaces Act, came after protesters loudly rushed the pulpit during a pro-life Mass at St. Joseph’s Cathedral. In addition to the fear and alarm caused to parishioners at this service, the Mass was disrupted and was not able to resume until all protesters were removed from the premises by law enforcement.
“The right to assemble and freely worship is protected by both our state and federal constitutions,” Yost said. “The Sacred Spaces Act now provides an enhanced penalty when that right is violated. My particular thanks go to former Rep. Rick Carfagna and Rep. Mark Johnson for their hard work on this important legislation.”
The Sacred Spaces Act also applies to the disruption of virtual services, sometimes known as “Zoom bombings.” During the development of this bill, the Attorney General’s Office became aware of several incidents in Ohio where virtual Jewish services were disrupted by anti-Semitic shouts and imagery.
Former Rep. Carfagna (R-Genoa Township) remarked how places of worship, regardless of the religion or forum, should always remain sanctuaries free from harassment.
“I’m grateful that the legislature acted on this important bill as a final matter of legislative business, and appreciate the tenacious efforts of Attorney General Dave Yost and State Rep. Mark Johnson to get this across the finish line,” Carfagna said.
Rep. Johnson (R-Chillicothe) called HB 504 “a strong step” toward protecting a basic right for Ohioans.
“In the past few years, we’ve realized just how vulnerable our right to practice religion undisturbed is,” he said. “The state must take steps to ensure the First Amendment right to freedom of religion is never infringed upon.”
Yost said he expects Gov. Mike DeWine to sign the legislation into law “very soon.”
The Department of Justice, together with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), today announced a settlement that, if approved by a federal court, will require Epic Games Inc. (Epic Games) to pay $275 million in civil penalties as part of a settlement to resolve alleged violations of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Rule (COPPA Rule), and the Federal Trade Commission Act. Epic Games will also be subject to a permanent injunction regarding children’s personal information that it previously collected. Epic Games is the developer of the online video game “Fortnite.”
In a complaint filed today in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina, the government alleged that Epic Games designed and marketed Fortnite for use by children. The government further alleged that Epic Games possessed actual knowledge that it collected personal information from children, including their names, email addresses, and identifiers used to keep track of players’ progress, purchases, settings, and friends lists. Epic Games nonetheless failed to notify parents that it was collecting children’s personal information and to obtain verifiable parental consent for that collection, as required by the COPPA Rule.
The government further alleged that Epic Games maintained default privacy settings that were unfair under Section 5 of the FTC Act, in that the default privacy settings publicly broadcast child and teen Fortnite players’ display names and put children and teens in direct, real-time communication with adult Fortnite players.
“The Justice Department takes very seriously its mission to protect consumers’ data privacy rights,” said Associate Attorney General Vanita Gupta. “This proposed order sends a message to all online providers that collecting children’s personal information without parental consent will not be tolerated.”
“Parents have a right to know and to consent before companies collect their children’s personal information,” said Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Brian M. Boynton, head of the Department of Justice’s Civil Division. “The department is committed to enforcing the protections against unauthorized collection of information from consumers, particularly children.”
“As our complaint notes, Epic used privacy-invasive default settings that harmed young Fortnite players,” said FTC Chair Lina M. Khan. “Protecting the public, and especially children and teens, from online privacy invasions is a top priority for the Commission, and this enforcement action makes clear to businesses that the FTC is cracking down on these unlawful practices.”
“This historic civil penalty, totaling over a quarter-billion dollars, lays down a marker for online service providers everywhere,” said U.S. Attorney Michael Easley for the Eastern District of North Carolina. “The unauthorized collection of personal information from children online violates the law. The Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission have a strong partnership and are committed to deterring violations.”
In a proposed stipulated order filed today, Epic Games has agreed to pay $275 million in civil penalties, the largest civil penalty ever imposed for a COPPA violation. If approved by the court, the order will prohibit Epic Games from collecting personal information from children in a manner that violates the COPPA Rule. It will also prohibit Epic Games from using children’s personal information that was previously collected unless it obtains verifiable parental consent, and imposes compliance reporting obligations upon Epic Games. Further, the agreement requires Epic Games to maintain default privacy settings that protect children’s and teens’ privacy, to delete certain personal information of children that it previously collected, and to maintain a comprehensive privacy program that protects certain personal information.
This matter was handled by Trial Attorneys Michael Wadden and Josh Fowkes and Assistant Director Lisa Hsiao of the Civil Division’s Consumer Protection Branch. Andrew Hasty, James Trilling, and Amanda Koulousias represented the FTC.
For more information about the Consumer Protection Branch and its enforcement efforts, visit its website at https://www.justice.gov/civil/consumer-protection-branch. For more information about the FTC, visit its website at https://www.FTC.gov.
