BY John Marzulli
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

Friday, March 19th 2010, 4:00 AM

A Bronx man is suing the city for $1.5 million because he missed his father’s funeral when he was arrested for soliciting sex – a charge that was later dropped.

Clifton Quarles Jr., fought the criminal charges for one year, refusing to accept a conditional discharge and demanding a trial.

Prosecutors dismissed the case after the cops who busted Quarles, 51, never showed up for court appearances – but that was too late to honor his father.

“It’s very upsetting,” he said in a statement released by his lawyer. “My father was my best friend and I missed his funeral. I will have to live with that for a lifetime.”

A security guard at a homeless shelter, Quarles was arrested Jan. 7, 2009, around 9:45 p.m. near his mother’s home in Bedford-Stuyvesant.

He had just spent the day making funeral arrangements for his father, who died of cancer.

He was walking on Putnam Ave. near Broadway carrying a suit for the funeral when he was approached by a woman wearing a black mini-skirt, he said.

The suit claims the woman offered him oral sex for $10 and he laughed and walked away.

The woman, who turned out to be an undercover cop, called for him to stop – and Quarles was handcuffed by plainclothes cops.

“Mr. Quarles vehemently denied any negotiation or agreement with the undercover regarding sexual favors,” his lawyer Christopher Galiardo said.

The cops refused to issue a desk appearance ticket or a summons – even after Quarles explained that his father’s funeral was the next day, Galiardo said.

He spent more than 24 hours in custody, released only in time for the burial.

After prosecutors got the case, Quarles refused to cut a deal because he wanted to clear the name he shared with his late father and mend ways with relatives angry over the arrest.

He made 10 court appearances before the case was dismissed in December. The suit names the city and arresting Officers Jason Ianno and Lenise Walker-Wilson. The undercover cop is not identified.

The city Law Department said it had not seen the suit.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/

BY MELISSA GRACE
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
Tuesday, June 08, 2010

Papa Smurf is broke – and behind bars.

Lawyer Stuart Ross made millions introducing the bizarre blue Smurf cartoon characters to the U.S. in the 1980s. Now he stands accused in a twisted plot to extort as much as $11 million from his rich son-in-law, Blackstone Group exec David Blitzer – and unable to make his $200,000 bail.

“He’s not in a position to afford bail like that,” Ross’ lawyer Matthew Myers said outside a Manhattan courtroom yesterday.

“He made some bad investments,” Myers said.

Ross, 73, concocted a scheme that would make the evil Smurf nemesis Gargamel blush.

He threatened to smear Blitzer’s reputation – and drag his good name through the mud.

Ross even went after his own daughter, Allison Blitzer, court papers say. At one point, Ross told the then-pregnant woman he hoped her child died – and that her gravestone “should be carved with a vile obscenity.”

The attempt to bilk Blitzer fell apart two years ago as the threats escalated – and when law enforcement was called in.

Ross and his co-defendant Stuart Jackson, his former lawyer, were indicted in 2008 for grand larceny and attempted grand larceny .

“These threats escalated to a point where Ross, through his attorney, defendant Jackson, told Blitzer’s attorney, Roger Stavis, that for $5.5 million, Ross would not try to visit his daughter or grandchildren and would stop harassing Blitzer and contacting his business,” State Supreme Court Judge Bonnie Wittner wrote in legal papers.

Other court documents mentioned figures as high as $11 million coming from Jackson.

At yesterday’s bail proceeding, Ross – who is essentially homeless and on the brink of divorce – laid out a sob story about his failing health.

“I have leukemia,” he said. “Almost every month I was in the hospital.” He also announced plans to represent himself at trial when a date is set at a hearing scheduled for June 28.

“You want to represent yourself,” Wittner told him. “I know you’re a lawyer. You know the risks.”

Ross once owned the North American rights to the Smurfs, investing in the blue cartoon figures from France in 1976, before they hit it big.

The Smurfs are bound for a new round of popularity: A live action movie starring Neil Patrick Harris, Katy Perry, Hank Azariaand Alan Cumming is due out next year.

Written by Melissa Grace for the New York Daily News – mgrace@nydailynews.com

Attorney for the defense: Matthew D. Myers

Written by Jason Fink with Newsday

Bernie Madoff will learn today whether he will die in prison. A few victims of the disgraced Wall Street financier, who faces a maximum 150 years in prison, will get their chance to tell Judge Denny Chin of the havoc the fraudster wreaked on their lives. Some of the thousand of other victims have already written to the court pleading for a harsh sentence. “He has condemned his investors to a life of hell.” wrote Emma DeVita of Pennsylvania, who said she invested with Madoff for 20 years and is now broke.

Hundreds are expected to descend on the lower Manhattan Federal courthouse where Madoff, 71, will be sentenced. His attorney Ira Sorkin has asked for 12 years, arguing that Madoff’s life expectancy is only another 13.

Prosecutors have asked that everything Madoff owns, including the substantial assets of his wife Ruth be surrendered. The money will be used to compensate the victims. While the last statements Madoff sent to investors in November totaled $65 billion, investors believe the true losses will run $13 billion to $21 billion. One attorney who has represented white-collar criminals said he expects Madoff to help prosecutors recover some of the money he stole – as well as provide information about any co-conspirators – in exchange for a reduction in the sentence after it’s handed down.

“He has to get some benefit or else why not just have a big circus of a trial?” said lawyer Matthew Myers.

QUEENS, NY (WABC News) — A Queens teacher is under arrest Wednesday, accused of sexually abusing a student.

Queens District Attorney Richard Brown says a 48-year-old teacher at a Springfield Gardens middle school, abused a 14-year-old boy in a classroom after school hours.

“The charges are very disturbing,” Brown said. “A classroom should always be a safe place for a child. If true, this teacher destroyed his student’s trust.”

The teacher, of the Hollis section of Queens, was employed as a teacher at Intermediate School. He was suspended during the pendency of the criminal case.

MSG Result: On June 23, 2009, after a two week trial, the teacher was acquitted of all criminal charges.

Attorney for the defense: Matthew D. Myers

Background Check At Time of Arrest Reveals Defendant Wanted On Rape Charges in Pennsylvania

DISTRICT ATTORNEY
QUEENS COUNTY
125-01 QUEENS BOULEVARD
KEW GARDENS, NEW YORK 11415-1568
718-286-6000

Queens District Attorney Richard A. Brown announced today that a former mortgage company employee whose civil lawsuit against the New York City Transit Authority was placed on hold earlier this year after the judge declared a mistrial and referred the matter to the District Attorney’s office for possible prosecution for fraud has, in fact, been charged with submitting false claims to the Transit Authority for which he received more than $16,000 in lost wages following a bus accident. In addition, while being processed prior to his arraignment, it was revealed that the defendant is wanted on a Pennsylvania warrant for an alleged 2004 rape.

District Attorney Brown said, “The defendant is accused of filing a false claim with the New York City Transit Authority for wages he said he lost after being unable to work in the aftermath of a bus accident. Claims like those allegedly filed in this case take money out of the pockets of all New Yorkers. While allegedly stealing from this agency is bad enough, it turns out that a warrant had been issued for the defendant who is wanted for the alleged rape of a minor in Pennsylvania.”

The defendant has been charged with third-degree grand larceny, third-degree insurance fraud, first-degree perjury and first-degree falsifying business records. He was arraigned last night before Queens Criminal Court Judge Suzanne Melendez and ordered held without bail because of his fugitive status. He refused to waive extradition to Pennsylvania. If convicted in the Queens case he faces up to four years in prison.

District Attorney Brown said that, according to the charges, the defendant claimed to have been injured in a bus accident on September 11, 2006, at the intersection of Baisley Avenue and Bedell Boulevard. As a result of the alleged accident, he filed a no-fault insurance claim for lost wages with the New York City Transit Authority. The defendant later testified under oath about the lost wage claim in connection with a lawsuit he filed against the NYCTA. The defendant testified that his earnings were approximately $5,000 a month, and that he had earned $4,000 during the month of July 2006 and $5,000 during the month of August 2006, according to a transcript of the proceeding, while working at Discount Home Mortgage, which is located at One Cross Island Plaza, Rosedale, Queens.

Furthermore, the District Attorney said, a New York motor vehicle no-fault insurance employer’s wage verification request allegedly submitted to the NYCTA by the defendant in support of his lost wage claim indicated that the defendant earned $3,000 a month at Discount Home Mortgage. Investigators from the District Attorney’s Detective Squad, however, spoke to the defendant’s former employer – the president of Discount Home Mortgage – and learned that he never signed the wage verification form and that the defendant did not earn $4,000 during July 2006 and $5,000 during August 2006, but in fact earned $1,100 during that period.

In addition, the District Attorney said, the defendant was fingerprinted following his arrest and as the prints were processed a warrant for the defendant issued in Pennsylvania was revealed indicating that the defendant was charged in Harrisburg, in Dauphin County, on June 14, 2005, for the alleged rape by forcible compulsion of a person under the age of 14 on December 20, 2004.

According to District Attorney Brown, the investigation of the grand larceny case began after it was referred to the District Attorney’s office for investigation by Queens Supreme Court Justice Duane Hart, who was overseeing the civil lawsuit brought by the defendant.

The investigation was conducted by Detective Joseph Brancaccio and Detective Patrick F. Dolan of the District Attorney’s Detective Bureau under the supervision of Sergeant Evelyn Alegre and Lieutenant Robert J. Burke, and the overall supervision of Chief Lawrence J. Festa and Deputy Chief Albert D. Velardi.

It should be noted that a criminal complaint is merely an accusation and that a defendant is presumed innocent until proven guilty. 

The Defendant is being represented my Matthew D. Myers.