Michael Levin
Former FBI agent from Las Vegas sentenced to 30 months in prison in New York
A former FBI agent from Las Vegas appeared before a federal judge in New York last month and was sentenced to 30 months in prison for stealing and selling bureau records.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Wayne Baker said Michael Levin has been in custody since his arrest in June 2001 and could be released as early as August.
Baker said prosecutors asked U.S. District Judge Denis Hurley to show Levin some leniency based on his cooperation in the case, and the judge agreed.
"Obviously, the government takes very seriously any allegations of wrongdoing within law enforcement," Baker said. "To his credit, however, upon his arrest he acknowledged his guilt and took all steps to rectify the wrongs he did."
New York attorney Richard Haley, who represented Levin in the criminal case, could not be reached for comment.
Levin resigned from the FBI in December 1997 after eight turbulent years with the agency's Las Vegas office. According to court documents, FBI officials had suspended him twice without pay.
In March 1999, he was licensed to work as a private investigator in Nevada.
His arrest in Oyster Bay, N.Y., sparked a series of events that led to criminal charges against nine other people, including James J. Hill, a communication security manager in the FBI's Las Vegas office.
Within days of his arrest, Levin pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges, as well as theft of government property and obstruction of justice. He admitted that he had been stealing and selling FBI records since about November 1999.
Hill pleaded guilty in September 2001 to conspiracy to steal FBI records, theft of FBI records, conspiracy to obstruct justice and obstruction of justice.
Between November 1999 and June 2001, according to a news release issued by federal prosecutors in New York, Hill provided Levin with hundreds of different FBI records and documents on criminal cases and grand jury investigations.
Hurley sentenced Hill in August to six years in prison.
Also charged in the case were Mary Ellen Weeks, a Las Vegas Municipal Court employee; Maria Emeterio, an investigator for the Nevada attorney general's office; and Las Vegas businessman Robert Potter, a defendant in a securities fraud case.
Weeks and Emeterio were accused of selling National Crime Information Center reports to Levin for $100 apiece. Potter was accused of conspiring to buy stolen FBI records from Levin.
In October 2001, Weeks and Emeterio each pleaded guilty to a felony charge of conspiracy to steal FBI records, and Potter pleaded guilty to conspiracy to receive stolen FBI records and conspiracy to obstruct justice.
Potter's sentencing is pending, but last year Hurley sentenced Weeks to five years of probation and Emeterio to three years of probation.
"They showed their remorse and sorrow at sentencing for the illegal acts they committed, and I don't anticipate them getting in trouble with the law again," Baker said. "Because they lost their employment, they won't be able to provide confidential documents in violation of their public trust."
Emeterio also is facing a federal lawsuit filed last month in Las Vegas by Melissa Gersh of Pasadena, Calif. Gersh claims Emeterio invaded her privacy while working as an investigator for the state.
According to the lawsuit, Gersh's mother worked for the state of Nevada, which recently was added as a defendant in the case.
"In an effort to justify terminating plaintiff's mother, defendants directed defendant Emeterio to investigate her background," the document alleges.
According to the complaint, Emeterio "unlawfully accessed state and federal data files which are limited to legitimate law enforcement objectives."
In April 2001, the lawsuit alleges, Emeterio went to Gersh's home and falsely identified herself as a police officer from Nevada. Emeterio then told Gersh that she had found her father and that he wanted to see her, according to the document.
Emeterio also told Gersh, according to the lawsuit, that her father had health concerns and wanted her to know about them.
"Plaintiff had not seen her father since she was 3 years old, when he was identified as a pedophile and plaintiff's mother had taken her away from him," the complaint alleges. "Plaintiff did not want her father to know where she and her children lived and did not want to know anything about him."
The lawsuit claims the privacy invasion caused Gersh "extreme emotional distress."
