Judge rejects Dixon movie studio con artist’s release from prison over COVID-19 diagnosis
A federal judge in Sacramento has denied Carissa Carpenter’s plea for release from a Texas prison because she has contracted COVID-19, telling the convicted Dixon movie studio con artist she’ll have to remain in custody.
In a two-page order filed Friday morning, U.S. District Judge Troy L. Nunley denied her latest motion for release, this one based on the fact that she has been diagnosed as having coronavirus and suffers from various other ailments that she says puts her life at risk.
Nunley noted that Carpenter sought compassionate release in a motion on April 27, “arguing she should be released because her medical conditions — including multiple surgeries and a congenital AV block treated with a pacemaker — put her at significant risk if she contracts COVID-19.”
The judge rejected that motion June 1, and Carpenter filed an appeal to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals two days later. That appeal is pending, but Carpenter’s attorney renewed her effort to win her release, arguing that since Nunley’s rejection Carpenter has been diagnosed with the virus inside the Federal Medical Center, Carswell, near Fort Worth.
Carpenter, 57, is serving a 78-month sentence following her indictment on charges of fraud and lying to FBI agents. She pleaded guilty to three counts in November 2018 and has a projected release date of Feb. 26, 2023.
She also has been ordered to pay more than $3,6 million to investors she swindled during nearly two decades of efforts to build movie studio projects in various Northern California communities.
Carpenter acquired — and spent — millions of dollars from investors she convinced her projects were real because she said she had the backing of members of Hollywood’s elite, including Star Wars creator George Lucas. Lucas later said he had never heard of her.
Carpenter, who owned no property of her own and once told investigators she could be considered homeless, never broke ground on any of her projects, including her last one, which she described as a $2.8 billion project in the Solano County town of Dixon.
The project fell apart following a Sacramento Bee investigation that led to her indictment.
This story was originally published September 4, 2020 at 10:39 AM.