Michele Fiore, a longtime RNC committeewoman and former Las Vegas city councilor, has been accused of stealing $70,000 from a charity she set up to build a memorial to a dead police officer, according to an indictment filed by the DOJ on Tuesday.
In 2018, at the opening of a park memorializing Alyn Beck, a Las Vegas police officer who was killed in the line of duty, Fiore proposed the city erect a statue to Beck, according to the Nevada Independent.
Fiore then allegedly contracted a company to create the statue and falsely told the company that “she had appropriated discretionary funds through the City of Las Vegas” to pay for it, according to the indictment.
ADVERTISEMENT
At the same time, Fiore had set up a charity in July 2019 which solicited donations to build the statue. Fiore operated the charity between July 2019 and January 2020 and promised “100 percent of the contributions” to the charity would go to the funding of the statue.
Fiore allegedly had all donations sent directly to bank accounts she controlled, and none of the money was used for the statue.
“Fiore instructed prospective donors to write a check to a bank account that Fiore controlled at Bank of Nevada,” the indictment alleges. “Fiore directed that money to be spent not for the charitable purpose solicited but for her own personal expenses.”
The indictment further alleges Fiore attempted to hide the money, moving the “fraudulently obtained contributions” from “the bank accounts of a Political Action Committee A and charity A into different bank accounts, including accounts controlled by Fiore.”
On one occasion, Fiore allegedly instructed a donor to write a $5,000 check to her PAC, which the donor thought was intended for the statue. That money was then, allegedly, used by an unnamed relative to pay Fiore’s rent.
The DOJ says Fiore also used the money to pay for her daughter’s wedding.
In total, the DOJ alleges that Fiore stole more than $70,000 of donations intended for the statue.
The indictment recommended Fiore be charged with four counts of wire fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud. Fiore, who currently serves as a Justice of the Peace in Nye County, could be sentenced to 20 years in prison if found guilty.
Fiore did not return The Daily Beast’s request for comment by the time of publishing.
Fiore was previously accused of accepting campaign donations that exceeded Nevada’s maximum contribution limit of $10,000, during her campaign for state treasurer in 2022, according to the Nevada Independent.
