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- A jury found Nevada official Michele Fiore guilty of misusing $70,000 meant for a memorial.
- The statue was to honor a Las Vegas police officer killed in the line of duty.
- Prosecutors said funds were spent on personal expenses like rent, plastic surgery, and a wedding.
A former Nevada official was found guilty on Thursday of using over $70,000 of funds raised for erecting a statue of a slain police officer for her own personal use, spending the money on rent, plastic surgery, and her daughter’s wedding.
A jury found Michele Fiore, who was a Las Vegas councilwoman at the time, up until 2022, guilty of six counts of federal wire fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit fire fraud.
Each count carries a maximum sentence of 20 years.
The jury returned the verdict within a few hours.
Fiore’s attorney told KLAS-TV that he intends to appeal the verdict, criticizing the jury for reaching a decision so quickly and suggesting they had “already made up their minds before the closing arguments.”
Fiore, a supporter of former President Donald Trump, had previously run for Nevada’s third congressional district in the Republican primary, losing the race, and most recently served as a justice of the peace for Nye County.
Prosecutors found that Fiore raised thousands of dollars through a charity, her campaign, and a PAC for a statue of Officer Alyn Beck, who was killed in the line of duty.
The Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department officer, along with fellow officer Igor Soldo, was shot and killed “execution-style” while eating lunch in June 2014, according to the Officer Down Memorial Page.
In an indictment document filed in July, prosecutors alleged that instead of using the funds for the commemorative statue, Fiore and a relative drained her charity and PAC accounts for personal use.
Prosecutors cited bank records to accuse Fiore of transferring the money to her personal accounts, to her daughter, withdrawing cash from ATMs, as well as purchasing cashiers’ checks.
In a search warrant affidavit, an FBI agent wrote that Fiore had put the money toward monthly rent payments, car loan payments, credit card charges, and luxury trips.
The FBI agent also wrote that Fiore had used cash to pay for her daughter’s wedding.
In another search warrant affidavit, an FBI agent wrote that donor money was spent on a vacation to the Caribbean, fares on a cruise line, a trip to California, and toward a Church of Scientology religious retreat on a cruise ship.
An exhibit list showed that FBI agents also seized invoice documents for a Las Vegas plastic surgery practice.
According to KLAS-TV, at the trial, federal prosecutor Dahoud Askar said: “Michele Fiore used a tragedy to line her pockets.”
Fiore’s sentencing is scheduled to take place on January 6 next year.
Her attorney, Michael Sanft, did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.