Five federal agents honored for roles in fighting crime

Rachael Levy

Monday, June 30, 1997 | 4:23 a.m.

Five federal agents who played critical roles in cases ranging from the kidnapping of a casino owner's daughter to a corrupt penny-stock king were honored recently for their superior work.

U.S. Attorney Kathryn Landreth for the first time singled out federal agents from the FBI, Internal Revenue Service, U.S. Postal Service and Secret Service based on their strong investigative techniques and interagency cooperation.

First Assistant U.S. Attorney Howard Zlotnick said last week the office plans to recognize federal agents' work on an annual basis. The five agents honored this spring were:

* IRS Special Agent Shaun Healy. Healy investigated the 1993 kidnapping of Kevin Wynn, the daughter of Mirage Resorts Inc. chairman Steve Wynn, and the case against Los Angeles gang members who robbed Harrah's hotel-casino at gunpoint in 1994 and took off with about $97,000.

Kevin Wynn was returned unharmed and her kidnappers, Ray Cuddy, Anthony Watkins and Jacob Sherwood, are in prison for from 6 1/2 years to 24 1/2 years. The gang members who have been sentenced are serving from six to 10 years in prison.

Healy, who has been an IRS agent since 1986, is an expert on money laundering, tax violations and financial crime, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Tom O'Connell, who heads all narcotic and violent crime prosecutions. Healy's skills strengthen prosecutors' evidence and ensure that convicted criminals get longer sentences, O'Connell said.

* IRS Special Agent Robert Salisbury. Salisbury helped build the case against penny-stock king Meyer Blinder. The case marked the first time the government pursued rackeetering charges in a penny stock scheme, which cost people millions of dollars.

Blinder was convicted in 1992, ordered to pay a $100,000 fine and imprisoned for 46 months. Salisbury's work also led to the conviction of 48 other people working in the penny stock scheme.

Salisbury, who became an IRS agent in 1985, has a "bright mind" that can quickly untangle complex accounting and tax issues, said John Ham, head of the U.S. attorney's white collar crime division.

* FBI Special Agent Chris Byers. Byers was instrumental in convicting Las Vegas attorney Norman Reed, who is serving a 57-month prison term for conspiring to commit insurance fraud. More than 100 people were part of this criminal ring that bilked insurance agencies out of about $500,000 by faking auto accidents and filing false insurance claims.

Byers has been an FBI agent for seven years.

* U.S. Postal Inspector Christopher Carrillo. Carrillo helped build the case against David Fisler, who sold get-rich-quick schemes through the mail and made $15 million. Eleven people were convicted in this scam that included crimes of mail fraud, money laundering and rackeetering. The court ordered the defendants to forfeit the entire $15 million, making it the largest mail fraud and forfeiture case to date.

Carrillo, who became a postal inspector in 1989, has a "photographic memory" that allowed him to quickly recall the details of a multitude financial documents and ensure a successful prosecution, Ham said.

* Secret Service Special Agent Ron Weiss. Weiss, a veteran law-enforcement officer with 22 years as a federal agent, acted as a mentor for new Secret Service agents as well as investigators from the other agencies. He is highly respected in the law enforcement community and "epitomizes the task force approach to working cases," Zlotnick said.

Weiss has assisted on a number of task-force prosecutions, including Operation Senior Sentinel, the nation's largest bust of fraudulent telemarketers.