The Utah Attorney General’s Office has charged 57-year-old Patrick M. Brody with nine counts of Communications Fraud and one count of Pattern of Unlawful Activity for accepting unfinished construction project downpayments.
Brody collected more than $200,000 from nine remodeling customers despite failing to start or complete any work. During December 2020 and October 2021, Brody’s scheme is believed to have victimized at least 25 clients.
In 2013, Brody served time in federal prison after being convicted of a real estate investment fraud scheme. Without disclosing his prior conviction, Brody partnered with Cornerstone Construction.
SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH — Attorney General Sean D. Reyes joined a comment letter to the Chairman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), led by the state of Oklahoma, opposing the FDIC’s proposed rule imposing a special assessment on FDIC-insured banks to pay for the bailout of uninsured depositors of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) and Signature Bank (Signature).
In March of this year, SVB and Signature abruptly closed, making them two of the largest bank failures in our nation’s history — and the most significant since the Financial Crisis of 2007-2008. Shortly thereafter, the Biden administration announced it would invoke the “systemic risk exception” (SRE) to reimburse uninsured depositors (i.e., depositors with more than $250,000 in their account) for their losses. The special assessment, if finalized by the FDIC, would recoup the FDIC’s losses from the bailout through a fee imposed on other FDIC-insured banks.
In their letter, the attorneys general argue that “the Federal Government’s reckless decision to invoke a systemic risk exception to bail out the elite clientele of SVB and Signature will have far-reaching and disastrous consequences” and that “the FDIC’s misguided priorities and neglect in oversight caused the crisis that predicated the invocation of a SRE to bail out SVB and Signature.”
The States write that “it is fundamentally unfair to pass on special assessment costs to other banking institutions who engaged in responsible business practices, unlike SVB and Signature. The States reiterate that it would be even more fundamentally unfair to pass on special assessment costs to community banks.”
Joining Oklahoma and Utah were the states of Idaho, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, and Texas.
This week, the Utah Attorney General’s Office supports law enforcement’s National Night Out Against Crime, an annual event to strengthen community relationships and boost crime prevention awareness.
On Tuesday, our Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force joined forces with the Grantsville Police Department and the Tooele County Sheriff’s Department and Fire Department to answer questions about increasing security in our neighborhoods. Our ICAC officers enjoy educating families about online safety.
This year, the newest ICAC team member, Agent Echo, joined in to greet people. Echo, an electronics-detecting K-9, can sniff out hidden electronic devices during investigations.
SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH — Today, in a victory for the rule of law, Utah Attorney General Sean D. Reyes announces that U.S. District Court Judge Ted Stewart has dismissed a lawsuit challenging the State’s requirement that pornography websites and other providers of harmful material to minors verify the ages of those accessing their websites.
Several plaintiffs, such as the Free Speech Coalition, which represents the porn industry, filed the lawsuit in May after the Utah legislature passed SB 287, a bill intended to protect young people from the harmful effects of pornography by requiring “reasonable age verification methods to verify the age of an individual attempting to access the material.” The State then moved to dismiss the lawsuit.
In its ruling, the Court reaffirmed a critical aspect of the separation of governmental powers — a federal court may only decide appropriate cases or controversies and not issue advisory opinions concerning the law. For this reason, the Court held that it did not have jurisdiction to hear the case because plaintiffs brought their lawsuit against defendants who are not charged with enforcing the law. In other words, there was no proper case or controversy before the Court. This provision of federal court jurisdiction helps to ensure that the judiciary does not inappropriately wade into the policy-making prerogatives of the legislative and executive branches.
General Reyes issued the following statement: “I applaud Judge Stewart’s decision. It is well-reasoned and consistent with other case law denying pre-enforcement challenges against public officials. Regarding the policy at issue, the innocence and safety of our children are paramount and worth protecting ardently. That is what our legislature did in passing S.B. 287, and that is what my office will continue to do when anyone attempts to undermine these reasonable safeguards for our children.”
This week, Utah Attorney General Sean D. Reyes joined an amicus brief, led by the State of West Virginia, in support of Loper Bright Enterprises. The brief was filed at the U.S. Supreme Court in Loper v Raimondo—a case of massive significance to the future of the Constitution and the separation of powers.
Loper Bright Enterprises is a fishing company based out of New England. Due to a National Marine Fisheries Service regulation, it was forced to hire a monitor on its boats. Loper filed suit against this edict but lost in the lower courts. In its decision, the D.C. Circuit deferred to the agency’s interpretation of the governing statute under the so-called Chevron doctrine, which instructs courts to defer to agency interpretations of ambiguous statutes rather than independently determine the proper meaning of the statute. Over the years, the Chevron doctrine has given vast power to government bureaucrats to regulate ever broader swaths of our economy and society. Loper is seeking relief at the U.S. Supreme Court, attempting to persuade the Court to jettison the Chevron doctrine once and for all.
General Reyes issued the following statement: “I have stated many times before that the Chevron doctrine is one of the greatest threats to individual liberty. For far too long, it has been wielded by big government proponents, unaccountable federal bureaucrats, and activist courts to destroy the freedoms of hard-working Americans and rob local control from our states.
“It is high time we rein in the nearly unchecked discretion of federal agencies to subversively disregard both the letter and intent of Congressional mandates in furthering their own political agendas or personal interests. We must de-activate the weaponization of agency power.
“I’m thankful for this coalition of attorneys general, and fervently hope the U.S. Supreme Court takes this case and strikes down this unconstitutional doctrine.”
In their brief, the attorneys general argue that the Chevron doctrine “has inflicted real and lasting damage on the States, on our citizens and businesses, on our ‘separation of powers,’ and, ultimately, on ‘our Constitution and the individual liberty it protects.’” The States write, “Rather than continuing to offer their ‘best independent judgment of [each] law’s meaning,’ courts began using Chevron as an ‘excuse[]…to abdicate their job of interpreting the law.’ … By giving ‘more policy discretion and law-making authority to administrative agencies,’ the decision changed ‘the nature of American government without the benefit of a constitutional amendment.’ Whatever limited reach the Court might have originally intended for it, Chevron quickly stretched to its furthest bounds.”
Joining West Virginia and Utah on this brief were the States of Alabama, Alaska, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, and Wyoming.
This week, Utah Attorney General Sean D. Reyes joined an amicus brief led by the States of Alabama and Arkansas, in support of Tennessee’s and Kentucky’s laws that “prohibit healthcare providers from performing sex-modification surgeries on and administering sex-modification hormones to minors.” The States filed the brief in the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit after district courts struck down the laws in both Tennessee and Kentucky.
The coalition of States argue that the district courts made two primary mistakes in adjudicating against Tennessee’s and Kentucky’s laws. First, the courts “assumed that heightened scrutiny (under the Equal Protection Clause) applies whenever a ‘minor’s sex at birth determines whether or not the minor can receive certain types of medical care.’” Second, the courts “relied on the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) Standards of Care and the imprimatur of American medical interest groups to find that laws prohibiting sex-modification procedures for children fail heightened scrutiny.”
In their brief, the attorneys general assert that certain courts (including the two in these cases) are attempting to force States, under the guise of the Fourteenth Amendment, to adopt nightmarish Standards of Care from WPATH. They write, “Thankfully, the Constitution does not put WPATH in charge of regulating medicine in Kentucky, Tennessee, or anywhere else. While a ‘legislative committee’ is free to consider WPATH’s position, the organization’s say-so does not ‘shed light on the meaning of the Constitution.’ … Amici write in support of the well-established authority that States have to enact health and welfare laws—even ones that conflict with WPATH’s horrifying standards.”
Joining Alabama, Arkansas, and Utah in filing this brief were the States of Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, and West Virginia.
Today, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals granted a stay in the case brought by the State of Utah regarding enforcing the EPA’s Ozone Transfer Rule.
In March, the Utah Attorney General’s Office pushed back against the Biden Administration’s EPA rule regarding air quality policies that could force the closure of Utah power plants and put reliable, affordable power at risk. Utah State leaders issued a joint statement before filing a lawsuit.
The stay will prevent enforcement of the EPA rule while the lawsuit plays out.
Last night, Attorney General Sean D. Reyes sent a letter to U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland, calling for the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) to uphold the time-honored tenets of the American justice system when it comes to legal investigations and treatment of the president’s son, Hunter Biden.
The letter from General Reyes follows comments expressed by the state of Louisiana and other states to the DOJ. Reyes asserts that significant deviations from conventional practices appear to have occurred, questioning whether those tenets were fairly applied in Hunter Biden’s case.
Today, Utah Attorney General Sean D. Reyes, Governor Spencer J. Cox, and Commerce Department Director Margaret Busse filed a Motion for Order to Show Cause against TikTok for failing to comply with subpoenas issued in the state’s case against the social media company.
Attorney General Reyes said: “For too long, two essential questions have gone unanswered: how is TikTok conducting itself in the State of Utah, and how is it impacting the lives of children? As Attorney General, I will never stop fighting for the safety of our children. That is why we filed a Motion asking the Court to order TikTok to cooperate with our subpoenas. We will not accept further excuses or delays. No one is above the law.”
See the full news release below.
Gov. Spencer Cox and Attorney General Sean Reyes press TikTok to respond to subpoenas SALT LAKE CITY (July 25, 2023) – Today, Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, Attorney General Sean Reyes, and Utah Department of Commerce Executive Director Margaret Busse announced a legal filing against the social media company TikTok, Inc. TikTok has been the subject of an investigation by Utah’s Department of Commerce’s Division of Consumer Protection in the state’s ongoing efforts to hold social media companies accountable for the harm they are causing to Utah’s children. After months of TikTok delaying and providing incomplete information in response to administrative subpoenas, the Division of Consumer Protection has filed a motion requesting the state district court to hold TikTok in contempt and force it to quickly comply with the subpoena.
“Utah will not stop insisting that social media companies be held accountable for the harm they are causing our youth,” said Gov. Cox. “That TikTok won’t even appropriately respond to the investigative subpoenas speaks volumes about the lack of TikTok’s credibility and transparency.” This motion is the initial judicial filing in the state of Utah’s unceasing demand that these companies do more to protect children from the harms of social media.
“For too long, two essential questions have gone unanswered: how is TikTok conducting itself in the State of Utah, and how it is impacting the lives of children? As Attorney General, I will never stop fighting for the safety of our children. That is why we have filed a Motion asking the Court to order TikTok to cooperate with our subpoenas. We will not accept further excuses or delays. No one is above the law,” said Attorney General Reyes.
This Motion for Order to Show Cause was filed in Utah state court in the Third Judicial District. The filing against TikTok, one of the largest social media companies in the world, comes after TikTok failed to respond completely to the Division of Consumer Protection’s two investigative subpoenas — one issued in February 2023 and the other issued in May 2023.
“Utah is taking a proactive approach to address the issue of harm to youth on social media,” said Margaret Busse, executive director of the Utah Department of Commerce. “The Utah Governor’s Office, Attorney General Reyes, and the Utah Department of Commerce are not willing to stand by while our young people are at risk. Utah residents deserve to have confidence in the companies they interact with, but TikTok’s evasive actions have eroded that trust.”
This week, agents from the Utah Attorney General’s CASE (Crimes Against State Economy) Strike Force arrested two men and recovered dozens of firearms and accessories stolen from Doug’s Shoot’n Sports store in Taylorsville. The two men who were arrested and charged are former employees of the store held in the Salt Lake County jail under a no-bond hold.
Investigators acted on a tip from the store’s owner. They confirmed that Stephen Daniel Cord, 41, of Tremonton, and Matthew Robert Provard, 25, of South Jordan, had stolen merchandise from the store for months. The Attorney General’s Office has charged Cord with five counts of Retail Theft and one count of Pattern of Unlawful Activity (2nd-degree Felonies) and Provard with one count of Retail Theft and Pattern of Unlawful Conduct, respectively.
The total value of the merchandise recovered is at least $41,000. It includes rifles, handguns, thousands of rounds of ammunition, silencers, optics, and other accessories. Detectives also seized a controlled substance with charges still pending.
The Attorney General’s CASE Strike Force was assisted by officers from the Taylorsville Police Department, West Jordan Police Department, Tremonton Fire Department, Box Elder Sheriff’s Department, and agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
