Baltimore’s State Attorney indicted on federal perjury charges

A federal grand jury has indicted Baltimore’s top prosecutor Marilyn Mosby on charges of perjury and making false statements with a series of financial transactions that helped her buy a condo on Florida’s Gulf Coast and another property near Orlando, Florida.

Mosby, 41, is charged with a false claim of financial hardship from the coronavirus to obtain an early withdrawal from her retirement savings to purchase the homes.

In addition, federal prosecutors allege she lied on a mortgage loan application by hiding an outstanding federal tax debt. They have accused her of entering into an agreement to rent out a home she bought in Kissimmee, near Disney World, while at the same time promising not to rent the property, all to obtain a lower interest rate.

Mosby stated that she was “unequivocally innocent,” in a news conference Friday, labelling the indictment as a politically motivated attack just months before an election. She did not address the charges in detail, acknowledging that there were some things she couldn’t say.

“But I wanted the people of Baltimore to hear it from me: I’ve done nothing wrong,” she told reporters. “I did not defraud anyone to take my money from my retirement savings and I did not lie on any mortgage application.”

When Mosby applied for two loans against her 457(b) retirement plan, she signed documents that indicated she “experienced adverse financial consequences” due to Covid-19, according to the indictment. However, the indictment said her gross income in 2020 was $247,955.58, an increase of nearly $10,000 from the previous year.

Mosby received $36,000 in May and $45,000 in December of 2020 from her retirement account, according to the indictment. The money Mosby received allegedly went toward the purchase of two vacation homes in Florida, and she is also charged with making false statements on the mortgage applications, according to the indictment.

She secured a $490,500 mortgage in 2020 and a $428,400 mortgage in 2021, but she did not disclose in the applications that she owed more than $45,000 in federal back taxes, the indictment says.

Additionally, Mosby allegedly stated that she would be the primary resident of one of the homes for at least a year in order to receive a lower mortgage rate. But she had already entered an agreement with a vacation home management company to rent out the house the week before, the indictment alleges.

She sold one of the properties in November for a $150,000 profit, the Baltimore Sun reported.

“Please don’t be fooled,” Mosby said at the news conference. “We are now five months from a next election and this indictment is merely a political ploy by my political adversaries to unseat me. Please also understand that I will never let that happen without a fight.” She did not take any questions from reporters.

Mosby’s lawyer also stated that she is innocent of all charges.B”I remain confident that once all the evidence is presented, that she will prevail against these bogus charges — charges that are rooted in personal, political and racial animus five months from her election,” attorney A. Scott Bolden said in a statement.

If convicted, Mosby faces a maximum sentence of five years in a federal prison for each perjury count and a maximum of 30 years for each count of making false statements on a mortgage application, according to the US Attorney’s Office for the District of Maryland. She could also be forced to forfeit any property found to have been obtained by fraud, the indictment says.

“We’re not commenting beyond what’s on the indictment. It speaks for itself,” Marcia Murphy, spokesperson for Maryland US Attorney Erek Barron, told CNN.