# Former law office manager jailed over missing evidence



## DANIPD (Jun 30, 2003)

Former law office manager jailed over missing evidence 







 
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By Julie Manganis
_Staff writer_

SALEM - The former office manager for a Beverly law firm accused of stealing money to start a dating Web site will spend at least a week in jail after a prosecutor accused her of erasing the contents of a company-owned laptop computer before she turned it over to investigators.

Meanwhile, the amount Heather Cimini is suspected of stealing has risen from $200,000 to at least $500,000, the prosecutor also said yesterday.

Cimini, 30, and her husband, former professional soccer player Jason Moore, 27, of Rockport, were in Salem District Court yesterday for a pretrial hearing in the larceny case now pending against them.

But they were in for a surprise when First Assistant District Attorney John Dawley asked that Cimini be taken into custody and held until she could produce the contents of the computer hard drive that she had erased.

Cimini had been out on $5,000 cash bail since her arraignment in December on charges that she had rung up hundreds of thousands of dollars in charges on company credit cards and had written checks to herself. Prosecutors suspect the money may have been used, in part, to launch "AmericanHookups.com," a dating Web site.

The site, which has been taken down, featured the slogan: "Real People. Real Sex. Real Advice." It also included a "blog" authored by Cimini, who wrote about sexually explicit topics. Cimini, who told co-workers that the money to start the site was coming from her in-laws, hosted lavish promotional events at Boston nightclubs and promoted them extensively on Boston radio stations.

Cimini worked for Williams and Mahoney, a firm in the Cummings Center whose clients include large businesses, for about two years - despite her record, which includes a 2002 conviction for forgery and larceny in Berkshire County in a similar but far less lucrative scheme. The law firm apparently was unaware of her criminal record.

But last fall, partner David Williams went to use a corporate American Express card to make a small purchase and learned that the card account had been suspended.

The firm's accountants soon discovered a trail of missing checks and suspicious credit card charges, including bills for airline tickets. At first, she allegedly pinned the suspicious charges on her husband but later acknowledged using the company's checkbooks and credit cards.

As investigators closed in, a lawyer representing Cimini arranged for her to turn herself in at court and also got her to agree to turn over the company-owned laptop, in exchange for prosecutors not charging her with stealing the computer. That became a condition of her release on bail.

But yesterday, Dawley said that Cimini had not honored her end of the deal, first stalling the return of the laptop, then changing its password.

When investigators finally obtained the password, Dawley said, they discovered that the hard drive had been wiped clean.

Dawley called Cimini's actions "contempt" of the court order that she turn over the computer and asked Judge Patricia Dowling to put her in jail, a request the judge granted.

"If she could produce the information that was on the hard drive, I might reconsider my request," Dawley told the judge.

A court-appointed lawyer who represented Cimini yesterday when her private attorney, John Maloney, did not show up, argued that she had complied with the request to turn over the computer.

But Dowling appeared skeptical, telling him, "I want Miss Cimini to understand how seriously I view this matter. This was a direct order from the court, and she took how she was going to obey that order into her own hands."

Several hours later, after Moore returned to court with a box of computer discs purportedly containing backup copies of the law firm's files, Dawley asked for additional time to review the discs, a request Dowling quickly granted after hearing about Cimini's background and record.

The judge scheduled a contempt hearing for next Friday.

If indicted and convicted, Cimini, who served six months in the Berkshire County case, could face state prison time.


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