Rachel Yould Update--Sentencing

Rachel Yould, the former Miss Anchorage, Fulbright and Rhodes Scholar who fraudulently obtained three-quarters of a million dollars to finance her high-flying academic career was sentenced last Friday to 57 months in the penitentiary.  The riveting tale of Ms. Yould's life, crime and sentencing reads like a mystery novel as I wrote on Bad Lawyer, last week.  This is reporter Lisa Demer's terrific follow-up story:

"Rachel Yould, a former Rhodes and Fulbright scholar from Anchorage whose promising academic career fell apart over fraudulent student loans, was sentenced Friday to four years, nine months in federal prison.  U.S. District Judge John Sedwick also ordered the 38-year-old Yould to pay nearly $750,000 in restitution to lenders, former employees and vendors of the Oxford International Review, a highbrow publication she edited while pursuing her doctorate. She also must serve five years of supervised release after she gets out of prison.

Yould, 38, pleaded guilty in June to 15 federal felony charges laid out in two indictments: 10 mail fraud counts, one wire fraud count and four charges of making false statements to a bank. In all she took out more than $679,000 in student loans, federal prosecutors said. They say about $403,000 went for noneducational expenses. Her deceits began after she ran up against her lifetime limits on subsidized loans, they say.

Despite her guilty pleas, Yould has maintained she is innocent and contends that her troubles arose from her efforts to escape her abusive biological father. She secured a second Social Security number to hide from him and says she received bad information from the government on how to use that new number.

But assistant U.S. Attorney Retta-Rae Randall said Yould deceived financial sources and academic institutions with "fraud, lies and manipulation." Over the 2 1/2-day sentencing hearing, Randall presented information showing that Yould used fabricated pay stubs and W-2 statements to support student loan applications. She co-signed for some of the loans using her old Social Security number and former name, Rachel Hall. She forged letters from her academic sponsor at Keio University in Japan. To secure more loans, she used the name and Social Security number of her husband, Brett Yould, who sat through the hearing in the front row. He said later that the extent of the fraud surprised him.

Prosecutors argued for a prison sentence of six years.  'Her greed is not about money,' Randall told the judge. 'Her greed is about connections and influence.'

Federal public defender Rich Curtner argued that Yould had an impeccable record before the fraud charges. She helped AIDS patients. She volunteered for Mother Teresa in India. She had a brilliant academic history. He argued that she has much more to give and shouldn't go to prison at all.

Curtner said he and Yould will discuss whether to appeal the sentence.

The judge said it was clear Yould, who has many supporters, had done much good in her life. But he also said she got caught up in her own vision of herself.  'I think what really happened is that Ms. Yould became enamored of the idea that she could have a prominent role, have great stature in the international academic community,'  Sedwick said in sentencing her. 'Indeed, she already had it. But she wanted to keep it. She wanted to pursue it. She wanted to embellish it. She wanted to make it better.'

And she committed fraud in her pursuit of that goal, the judge said.

He directed her to begin her prison sentence immediately.

She surrendered to U.S. marshals at the close of the hearing, after she had a few last minutes with family, friends and supporters. They lined up to say goodbye.  'Who's next?' Yould asked, smiling. She gave big hugs to them all, telling one advocate 'you're so good.'

COURTROOM CROWD

Yould's case became a cause celebre among domestic-violence advocates. Her sentencing hearing, a sort of mini-trial, drew backers from Anchorage and all around the country. There was a court blogger from San Francisco, a supporter from Minnesota, an advocate from Hawaii, who testified at the sentencing.

Her supporters say she is one of many women who have encountered problems with the Social Security program intended to protect victims by allowing them to create a new identity. Anchorage-based STAR, or Standing Together Against Rape, included a call to action in an internal newsletter for staff and volunteers urging advocates to 'pack the courthouse' at Yould's sentencing.   STAR mainly wanted to show support for Yould's 'safety plan,' which included escorts and other measures to protect her from her abuser, who they believe still presents a risk, said program director Keeley Olson.

Her family sat in the front row behind the defense table, including her husband and mother-in-law, her retired schoolteacher mother and stepfather, who adopted her as an adult. An uncle came from Alabama.   In all, more than a couple dozen supporters showed up for Yould.

After the hearing, Brett Yould said Rachel  'has a lot of problems, stemming directly from serious, serious abuse.'  That's no excuse for what she did, he said.  'She is very troubled. Our entire relationship -- I spent a lot of time trying to support her emotionally. It's been a long and hard road, it really has.'  He said he cares for her and wanted to give her support during such a rough time. But he said he told her about six months ago that no matter how the court case resolved, he would seek a divorce.  'This whole thing is just sort of more chaos, and Rachel's life has always been chaotic like this,' Brett Yould said. 'I've always been asked to step in and save her at the last minute on many occasions. And I can't do that anymore.'  He said he's certain Rachel was subjected to years of abuse and torture 'at the hands of a madman. Her biological father.'  Her father has never been charged with violence against her, but Rachel Yould has said in court papers that he abused her sexually, physically and emotionally through her childhood and into adulthood.

She's spent her adult life trying to overcome deep feelings of inadequacy, Brett Yould said.

A NEW IDENTITY

Prosecutor Randall told the judge that Yould committed a 'sophisticated, international fraud. You can't fathom why someone with all those advantages ends up at this dead end,' the prosecutor said. 'She has no moral compass.'

What really offends prosecutors, Randall told the judge, is how Yould blamed her troubles on the federal program through which some 14,000 women and children have secured new Social Security numbers to hide from abusers and stalkers.  Victims who could benefit may instead fear the program because of Yould's assertions that she was just following the guidance of unnamed Social Security field officers. If someone is trying to hide from an abuser, why include the old Social Security number on a loan form along with the new one? Randall said.  'How much damage has she done to that program?'  Randall asked.

When Yould was given a turn to speak, she answered that 'we follow these instructions not because they make sense but because we believe in the authority of the information the government provides us and because we fear for our lives.'

Sedwick said he never doubted that Yould had the right to a second Social Security number. But for Yould, with all her smarts, to blame federal bureaucrats 'borders on the ludicrous,' the judge said.  Sedwick said defendants usually stand before him with only a lawyer on their side. No family. No friends. No advocates from around the world.  'There is much to be said for the proposition that Ms. Yould is a conniving and manipulative person,' Sedwick said. 'Certainly her behavior suggests that this is true. On the other hand it's clear there's more to her than that. One needs only observe how many friends and supporters she has had by her side throughout this sentencing hearing to realize the picture painted by the government is too severe.'

Yould said she regrets what happened and is saddened for any hardships to others. But she never said she did wrong. 'The violence and stalking I've suffered are not actually the hardest experiences I've endured,' Yould said, speaking in a clear, confident voice. 'The most difficult thing for me is the isolation brought on by living a life that most people seem unable to relate to or understand. It's a very lonely experience.'"
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As I said before, Rachel Yould may well be a conniving and manipulative fraudster, but where did she learn the behavior, and why?  My sense is that this is a very damaged woman with a history of child sexual abuse.  I hope that the next couple of years enables her a degree of recovery and peace.  

She needs to get honest with herself and others as a first step to recovery. 

Former Miss Anchorage, Rhodes and Fulbright Scholar Scam Artist?

This woman (pic), Rachel Yould, is a former Miss Anchorage, Fulbright and Rhodes scholar and a convicted fraudster.  The Anchorage Daily News account of her pending sentencing is mystery story on its own.  This is from Lisa Demer's story: 

"Prosecutors say Rachel Yould, a former Anchorage Rhodes and Fulbright scholar, is a master manipulator who should spend six years in prison for misusing hundreds of thousands of dollars in student loans. They say she should pay more than $800,000 in restitution.

Yould, despite her guilty pleas to 15 felony counts of federal mail and wire fraud and making false statements, says she is innocent and that the whole case is based on misunderstanding. Her troubles are rooted, she said, in the sexual and physical violence she suffered as a child and into adulthood at the hands of her biological father. Her lawyer argues that she shouldn't go to prison at all, but instead should be sentenced to probation so that she can repay what she owes.

The defense says her efforts to escape her father's reach led her to create a second identity for her own protection; prosecutors say it was a scheme to draw down more student loan money because she had reached her lifetime limit.

A sentencing hearing is scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday in U.S. District Court in Anchorage. Judge John Sedwick will decide her fate. The judge allowed two days for the hearing, noting 'the unprecedented volume of paper filed by the parties in anticipation of the sentencing.'

Whatever happens, the life Yould envisioned as a bright young scholar is gone.

'As for just punishment, Rachel Yould has already been punished beyond any sentence the court can impose,' her attorney, federal public defender Rich Curtner, wrote in his sentencing memorandum to the judge. 'Her life has been on hold for four years. Her career is finished, her reputation is ruined, her former life in remnants. After all of her work and research, her Doctorate is unobtainable. She faces a staggering debt she is committed to repay.'

[So She Set Up A New Identity and Got a New SSN]
Yould, 38, is a 1990 Bartlett High graduate and 1996 Miss Anchorage, though she says she gave up the title so that another contestant could get the scholarship and travel benefits. She graduated from Stanford University with a 4.0 grade point average, then went to Oxford University in England as a Rhodes scholar, where she earned her master's degree in oriental studies.

By 2001, Yould had won a Fulbright scholarship and was working on her doctorate comparing the Internet in Japan to its counterpart in the United States. Her studies took her to Keio University in Japan.  That same year, Yould found out she had reached the $60,000 lifetime cap in Alaska's student loan program. And she applied for a new Social Security number through a program intended to protect victims of domestic violence, the Harassment, Abuse & Life Endangerment program. It took her nearly two years to obtain the new number.

Between August 2003 and May 2006, while Yould was living in Japan, she obtained 19 student loans for almost $680,000, prosecutors say. They say her lies included telling lenders she was a medical student, forging documents from real academics, and listing her former name, Rachel Hall, on loan documents as a co-signer.  She parked some of the illegally gained money in a Smith Barney investment account and played the stock market, earning more than $50,000 on her investments. With the rest, she started a high-brow international affairs journal. At one point, she hired former Truman Scholars to interview people in Iraq.

And for much of the time the loan money was pouring in, she wasn't even in school and didn't incur tuition or other fees, prosecutors say.  Yould and her supporters say she created the second identity with government approval to hide from her father [who she says sexually abused her and], whom she says was stalking her. She used both names to get loans 'on the explicit instruction of Social Security Administration personnel,' Curtner wrote in his sentencing memo.

In all, more than $650,000 of her student loan funds were obtained fraudulently, prosecutors said.

[Allegations of Sexual Abuse Against her Father]

Yould wrote two long statements to the judge about her studies, the loans and her accusations against her father. She wrote of genital mutilation, childhood rape, harassment and stalking. Her parents divorced when she was young and the abuse usually happened when she visited him, she wrote. Her lawyer calls her father a sexual sadist. She said she has internal injuries as a result of the abuse.

But prosecutors challenge many of her assertions, and her father has never been charged criminally with sexually abusing her.  Once when she was a child, she blurted out to parents of the children next door that her father was beating her and hurting her in other ways, she said in a March statement filed in court. They scolded her for telling lies and called her father, she wrote.  In an attempt to explain [in her sentencing statement] why she felt powerless to hold him accountable, she recounted one grisly and bizarre scene that she said haunts her more than the abuse itself.

She was a young woman visiting her father's home looking through her stuff in the basement when something caught her eye.

"I walked close and stared and then suddenly felt like a cosmic jolt had just vacuumed all of the air out of my chest," Yould wrote to the judge in a 150-page statement filed on Friday. "It was a hunk of desiccated flesh pinned to the wall and I knew from the approximate size and shape and just the nature of life in that house that it was mine. It was a piece of me pinned to the wall. I had had a portion of flesh pulled from my right hip in an event I will not even attempt to describe here, and there it was, pinned to the wall."

She [ . . . ] sought a restraining order against her father in 2002 after the Social Security Administration told her that one was typically provided as justification for a new Social Security number. While she won a temporary order, her request for a long-term protective order from an Alaska judge was denied since she was living in Japan and her father was in Georgia. But she didn't tell the Social Security officials that, prosecutors noted.  Prosecutors say that Yould is the sole source of much of what she contends. The medical records provided to prosecutors don't include the sort of injuries she describes, assistant U.S. Attorney Retta-Rae Randall wrote in the prosecution's 120-page sentencing memorandum.  'The case is not about abuse, but about lies and greed,'Randall wrote.

The government never argued that she wasn't abused, Randall wrote. Rather, 'it requested corroboration when the details became more fantastical after Yould learned that she was under investigation. If Yould can fly all over the country for medical evaluations for her case, then she could have, at a minimum, provided the names of one or two hospitals from which records could be subpoenaed.'

In her statement, Yould disputes she was motivated by greed. She says she never lived lavishly and used the loan money for her studies. 'I have owned one car in my 38-year lifetime. It was the 1985 Honda Accord my parents bought when we moved to Alaska when I was 13 years old,' she wrote. Her wedding ring was her great-grandmother's. Most of their time in Japan, she and her husband lived in a 485-square-foot apartment.  She says the prosecution will never believe her history of abuse because the police were never called, and there isn't much in the way of medical records from the time. Plus, with her academic success, she says she doesn't seem like the type of person who had been through so much.

By claiming to be a victim, [AUSA] Randall wrote, '[Yould] wrapped herself in an untouchable defense. It is a continuing manipulation of the court.'"
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Believe what you wish to believe, but don't get too distracted.  Rachel Yould committed faud and admitted it.  Likewise, I evaded my tax obligations.  The stories of our lives may or may not impact the disposition of our legal matters.  My father was a child molester, and his violent and abusive behavior against me and my brothers created space for him  to commit his crimes against my sisters and other young girls.  Don't take my word for it, my sisters and other victims say so.  I fled the family home, like my brother did before me at 17.  I take my sisters' word for it--I should have taken the word of my sister, M. without doubting her.  But I injured her with my doubt. 

Rachel Yould may or may not have been a victim of sexual abuse;  while I find her story beyond bizarre, many times over the years the most bizarre stories of child sexual abuse proved true.  Clients would come to our office and describe something so strange, bordering on the unbelievable and then produce a letter in the hand of the perpetrator acknowledging the facts, or a cassette recording of a confrontation, pornographic photographs, or other evidence of bizarre inexplicable crimes by family members, clergy or close family friends. 

Rachel Yould is a brilliant, educated, sophisticated woman, and, a convicted liar--now ask yourself, where did she learn her dark arts?  Bet I can make an educated guess, bet you can too.  The next question is, what disposition will deter her from further criminal activity?    It's a mystery.

Former Fed Law Clerk and Peeping Tom Off to Jail

Daniel Eisman, a lawyer and former law clerk to a federal judge was sentenced to 5 years in prison for voyeurism and child porn.  This striking account is from reporter Lisa Demer at the Anchorage Daily News which provided the account of Rachel Yould's fraud conviction and sentencing last year.  Here's Ms. Demer's account of Eismans's sentencing:

"Daniel Eisman, a former law clerk to a federal judge in Anchorage, was sentenced Thursday to four years in prison after pleading guilty to indecent viewing and child pornography charges. At the sentencing hearing before state Superior Court Judge Gregory Miller, one victim testified by phone and another attended in person, telling the judge about the pain and sense of betrayal inflicted by Eisman. The indecency charge relates to secret cameras he placed around his home and in a cabin.

In all, prosecutor Roman Kalytiak identified six victims by their initials. Victims told the judge at least a dozen people can be seen on the videos in various states of undress or even using the bathroom.  'The people in these videos are not strangers,' Kalytiak said. 'These are people who were friends of the defendant's.' Some were co-workers.

Eisman clerked for U.S. District Judge Timothy Burgess (a 2005 Bush appointee,) as did the victim who stumbled across the videos last May on a hard drive connected to his home computer. She had permission to use the computer and was apparently looking for winter carnival pictures from Fur Rondy, Kalytiak said.   She found Eisman's secret instead.
The co-worker was a frequent babysitter for Eisman and his wife. She attended the birth of their child. She spent holidays with Eisman, his wife and his parents. He was one of her best friends, she said in telephone testimony.  The woman was babysitting for Eisman's family on May 5, 2010, when she came across a file with her name on it.

'On that date, I learned that Dan had been videotaping me, recording me in the most vulnerable moments every chance he got,' she said.

Eisman, who is 36, admitted setting up cameras in his guest bathroom, guest bedroom and other rooms in his home and in a family cabin in an effort to secretly peep on men and women. The cameras were hidden in a lamp, picture frame and carbon monoxide detector, among other places.

The coworker said the videos showed her undressing in various rooms over an eight-month period. At least once, Eisman encouraged her to take a shower in the guest bathroom.

She said she suspected he had been making his secret videos of his friends' private moments for at least five years. He had amassed an enormous collection, she said. She said she was particularly concerned by the hundreds of downloaded child pornography images found on the computer. They were mixed with photos of his own baby boy so that he could look at his son, then child porn, one image after another.  'I fear that if left unchecked these boundaries may have become blurred in his real life as well,' she said. 'I am deeply concerned for the safety of his now 1-year-old boy.'

She turned the hard drive over to Anchorage police, who obtained a search warrant for it, Kalytiak said.  The coworker testified that she's been devastated since finding the videos last May, not only because of the loss of her own privacy, but because of the hurt everyone suffered, including Eisman's wife -- her friend.

'It's a horrible thing to have to turn your former best friend into the police,' she told the judge. But it was the right thing to do, she said.

A second victim also testified, a man who said he too was a co-worker and friend of Eisman.  'I want to speak for the untold victims who are not here, because they are pillars of our community and their reputation is so easily destroyed by something of this nature,' the second victim told the judge.

Eisman used many ruses to entice women into his home, the man told the judge. He hosted parties. He used his own child to lure baby sitters to his cameras. He arranged his videos by name and labeled some as 'good.'

None of the videos were ever posted on the Internet, his defense lawyer, Andrew Lambert, told the judge. The defense and prosecution worked out a plea deal that is severe, but fair, he said, urging the judge to accept it.   When it came to Eisman's turn, he admitted that 'what I did was simply wrong.'  He said he's already getting help from a psychologist.

'As for the victims, it's more than a bit ironic because we were truly friends before I betrayed their trust,"'Eisman said in court. 'No words will give you back what I took. You have every right to be angry, every right to want to lash out, every right to hate me[. . . ]  What I did didn't stem from malice. It stemmed from curiosity, addiction, and a failure of my moral compass. But ultimately the fault is my own.'

Eisman said he was grateful that his wife had supported him throughout the ordeal, though the marriage is now ending. Maybe his victims will take solace in what he's losing: 'A job, a career, my wife, my law license and my reputation.'  The worst of it will be the lost years with his son, he said, breaking into tears as he talked about the 'messy meal times, play times in the park and a dozen other firsts."'

In pronouncing the sentence, Judge Miller paraphrased a psychologist in town who says it takes 20 years to build up a reputation and 20 minutes to tear it down.

'And you have succeeded like no one I've ever seen before in doing that,' Miller told Eisman.

In addition to the prison time, Eisman must register for 15 years as a sex offender and will be on probation for five years.  Eisman walked out of the courtroom, his hands behind his back his shackles, to begin his prison sentence."
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Mr. Eisman worked for U.S. District Judge who was a former U.S. Attorney (Hon. Timothy M. Burgess)--of course, Eisman has no explanation for his acts. Those acts are inexplicable as are most bad acts by those of us who know better.