Wilmington – Attorney General Beau Biden announced today that a Child Predator Task Force undercover investigation resulted in the arrest of a Delaware student for soliciting a detective posing as a child for sex.

“We created the Child Predator Task Force to use technology to find predators in the places where they target kids and take them off the streets before they can harm children,” Attorney General Biden said.  “I’m proud of the work they’re doing every day to keep our families safe.”

An undercover detective with the Child Predator Task Force, posing online as a 13 year-old girl, was contacted by 26 year-old Christopher D. Ginelli.  During multiple online chat sessions Ginelli solicited the fictional girl to meet and have sex with him.  As a result of the investigation, detectives determined that Ginelli was communicating from Widener University School of Law, where he was a 3rd year law student.  On Thursday, May 9 the Child Predator Task Force executed a search warrant at Ginelli’s residence at the University’s Shipley Hall Dormitory on Concord Pike in Wilmington, where they seized a laptop computer and other digital media.  Detectives arrested Ginelli, age 26, of Lakewood, NJ, and charged him with four counts of sexual solicitation of a child.  He was arraigned by video phone and was ordered to be held on $60,000 secured bail.  He subsequently posted bail and was released from the James T. Vaughn Correctional Center.

Widener University cooperated fully with the Task Force and assisted in the criminal investigation.
The investigation, including a complete forensic analysis of the evidence, continues.  A booking image of Ginelli is attached.

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Landlord training June 9 in Harrington to focus on proven techniques to reduce crime in rental properties

Wilmington – As part of its ongoing action to reduce crime and improve the quality of life in throughout Delaware, Attorney General Beau Biden announced today that his office is expanding its landlord training initiative to give property owners the knowledge and tools they need to combat criminal activity on their properties and avoid legal sanctions under the state’s Drug Nuisance and Social Vices Abatement Act.  Four day-long trainings have already been held by his Nuisance Abatement Program in Wilmington.  The next landlord training session – to take place Saturday, June 9 in Harrington – expands the initiative statewide.

“Over the past year we have trained more than 200 landlords on how to reduce neighborhood crime,” Biden said.  “Landlords may not live on the same streets where they own rental properties, but they still have responsibilities to those communities.  Our training gives owners information they need to prevent and respond to crime that occurs on their properties, but also makes it clear that we will take legal action against them if they allow that activity to take place.”

The Attorney General’s landlord training initiative addresses a pattern of criminal activity at rental properties.  The initial focus was the City of Wilmington, where approximately half of its 32,000 properties are rentals.  The majority of criminal nuisance complaints in Wilmington and statewide that have been referred to Biden’s Nuisance Abatement Program stem from rental properties whose owners often claim to be unaware of the illegal activity on-site.  These landlords frequently fail to perform criminal background checks on their tenants, and often have deficient leases and rental applications, or none at all.

To proactively reduce crime in rental properties, the Attorney General’s Office is holding day-long training seminars to ensure that property owners understand their responsibilities under the law and have the tools to not only be effective landlords, but responsible community members as well. The next training will be held Saturday, June 9 from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the Harrington Fire House, 50 Clark Street.  It will feature presenters from the Attorney General’s Office, police, and private legal practices.  Presentations will cover topics including identifying gang and drug activity, criminal background screening, eviction proceedings, Fair Housing laws, nuisance property laws, and crime prevention through environmental design. The trainings are focused on landlords, but are open to anyone. While training is voluntary, failure to attend or failure to abide by the suggestions will be factored into determining future courses of legal action against certain properties and their owners.

Harrington Police Chief Norman Barlow said about the June 9 training, “We are excited to bring this program to Harrington, I think it will be very helpful to landlords on selecting tenants. We are looking forward to working with the Department of Justice to get this training out to landlords on some important issues when you are renting your property out.”

Landlords, tenants, and members of the community who have questions about this week’s landlord training, or want to report a property to the Attorney General’s office are encouraged to call the Nuisance Abatement Program at (302) 577- 8500.

The Attorney General’s Nuisance Abatement program uses the state’s Criminal Nuisance Abatement Act to identify and investigate properties where drug, gun and violent crime is permitted to flourish, and offers property owners the choice to abate the nuisance or be forced to defend themselves in court.  The Attorney General’s office identifies nuisance properties statewide through its own investigations and in cooperation with state and local police agencies, local authorities, civic associations, and neighborhood residents. To date, over 125 nuisances have been abated and nearly 400 properties remain on the Program’s “watch list.” Additionally, 16 properties have been shut down because they were found to present an immediate threat to the health, safety and welfare of the surrounding community.

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Wilmington – Attorney General Beau Biden unveiled a plan Thursday to allocate the $10.6 million his office secured for Delaware following an 18-month investigation of widespread mortgage servicing fraud by five of the nation’s largest banks.

Speaking at the Wilmington Rotary Club’s annual Law Day, Biden said his office has been working for several months to develop a detailed plan that will deliver the most benefit to all Delawareans, especially those homeowners who have been most affected by the foreclosure crisis.

“We have been focused on investigating wrongdoing, fixing what is broken, and making sure it never happens again,” Biden said.  “My office has developed a plan to maximize the $10.6 million I secured.  We look forward to working with legislators and stakeholders to implement our plan.”

Specifically, the plan Biden laid out Thursday includes:

·         $1.8 million to fund borrower representation

·         $500,000 to support the Delaware Emergency Mortgage Assistance Program (DEMAP)

·         $1 million to fund a new education and borrower representation program housed at a Delaware educational institution

·         $1.5 million to fund additional Delaware-based housing counselors

·         $1.1 million to fund expanded consumer education initiatives

·         $863,000 to hire additional staff in the Attorney General’s Office of Foreclosure Prevention, including loan modification specialists to assist borrowers facing foreclosure and financial difficulty

·         $895,000 to support the Delaware Mortgage Mediation Program, including a full-time mediator

·         $2.7 million to continue to investigate and prosecute financial fraud cases

Biden also highlighted Delaware mandatory Mortgage Mediation Program, an initiative he and a bipartisan group of legislators championed last year to ensure struggling homeowners can have a meaningful conversation with their lender about alternatives to foreclosure. Under the program, banks must attend a fact-to-face meeting with a homeowner before they can move forward with a foreclosure action.

Delaware’s mandatory mediation program launched on January 19, 2012.  In the week leading up to that date banks filed 308 foreclosure actions – 153 alone on January 18.  Since January 19, only 14 residential foreclosures that are eligible for the mediation program have been filed.

Overall, Biden secured $46 million for Delaware in the National Mortgage Foreclosure Settlement. The remaining $35 million will be provided by banks in the form of credits to current and former homeowners to reduce principal mortgage loans, pay off second mortgage loans and waive deficiencies in short sales and fund refinancing to underwater homeowners who are current on their mortgages, as well as payments to individual Delaware homeowners who have been foreclosed upon.

Since the housing crisis began in 2008, there have been 26,000 foreclosure filings in Delaware and more than 10 million nationally.

51 Attorneys General propose raising spending cap on Crime Victims Fund

Wilmington – Delaware Attorney General Beau Biden and his colleagues in 50 states and territories urged Congress this week to increase support for victim services through a federal grant program that provide essential funding for state and local victim assistance programs.  In a joint letter to federal lawmakers the Attorneys General called for increasing to $1 billion the annual spending cap on the Crime Victims Fund, which was established by the 1984 Victims of Crime Act (VOCA).  Monies in the fund come entirely through collections from criminal fines, special assessments and other penalties paid by federal criminal offenders.
“We have an obligation to provide victims with the support they need to fully participate in the criminal justice system and to rebuild their lives,” Attorney General Biden said.  “By releasing more of the money that is already held by the Crime Victims Fund – money that has been paid by offenders as a part of their sentences – we’ll be better able to meet the critical needs of crime victims and their families.”

In Delaware, monies received from the Crime Victims Fund are disbursed by the Delaware Criminal Justice Council, which has seen its annual allocation from the Fund drop from $1,650,000 in Fiscal Year 2011 to $1,513,000 in Fiscal Year 2012.  The Criminal Justice Council funds domestic violence shelters, counseling services, and victim services staff in state and local government agencies and non-profit services providers.  These programs support thousands of survivors of homicide, domestic violence, sexual assault, child abuse, crimes against seniors, and other violent crimes.

Every year, VOCA victim assistance grants provide vital assistance that supports more than 4,000 agencies nationwide in providing services to an average of 3.7 million victims of assault, robbery, gang violence, intoxicated drivers, fraud, elder abuse, domestic violence, child abuse and neglect, sexual assault, stalking and survivors of homicide.  VOCA also helps victims with financial assistance for medical care, mental health counseling, lost wages, and funeral and burial costs.

The Attorneys General letter is available online at http://www.naag.org/sign-on_archive.php.

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Wilmington – Today a New Castle County Superior Court jury recommended, in a vote of 11 – 1, that James Cooke received a death sentence for the rape and murder of University of Delaware student Lindsay Bonistall in her off-campus apartment in Newark, Delaware.  On April 13th, after a trial that lasted five weeks the same jury found Cooke guilty of First Degree Murder, Rape, Burglary, and Arson involving the death of Lindsey Bonistall in May, 2005.  Cooke was also tried and convicted of two nearby burglaries of two young women in the days leading up to the killing.

The next step in the case is sentencing, in which Superior Court Judge Charles H. Toliver, IV will impose a sentence of life in prison or a sentence of death.

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