AG civil trial of former Taunton property owner Michael O'Donnell wraps up

DEDHAM — His capacity for deception was nothing short of “breathtaking,” and as a result, former Star Theater/Leonard Block building owner Michael W. O’Donnell potentially could be on the hook to the commonwealth for a quarter million dollars.

During closing arguments Friday at a civil trial that began in November, Assistant Attorney General Eric Carriker asked Superior Court Judge Brian Davis to consider imposing a penalty of between $200,000 and $260,000 on the 51-year-old Roslindale native.

That restitution, Carriker said, would be paid to the state’s general fund and would be consistent with the nearly $1.3 million assessed value of properties that formed the centerpiece of the AG’s case.

During the past two years, O’Donnell has forfeited ownership to the city of Taunton of those properties, including the Star Theater at 107-111 Main St.; High Street Extension parcels 4 and 6; and a 16-acre former garden center at 115 Tremont St.

All of the formerly junk-filled, blighted properties have since been cleaned up. The four-story, dilapidated Star Theater was recently demolished.

The restitution would also factor in a scheme in 2005 when O’Donnell allegedly exploited his position as a board member of Pro-Home Inc. to take advantage of a now-deceased elderly woman — by convincing her to take out a home-improvement loan with a fictitious financial lender, created by O’Donnell, in order to foreclose on her Margaret Road house and sell it back to himself.

The AG’s five-year investigation and resulting complaint, which was last amended in 2009, accuses O’Donnell and his former lawyer, R. David Cohen, of accumulating property in Taunton by engaging in unfair and deceptive real estate practices — mainly by means of aliases, phony names and fictitious non-profit agencies.

Cohen, who specialized in real estate closings, was recently indicted on federal charges of depositing $994,000 in fraudulently obtained IRS refund checks.

He avoided being a codefendant in the AG’s case by having paid a $40,000 penalty in 2013 and agreeing to no longer engage in real estate transactions with O’Donnell.

Carriker said the use of aliases and the creation of fictitious characters, whose names regularly appeared on legal documents that benefited O’Donnell, were evidence of how O’Donnell “obfuscated his responsibility and kept Taunton at bay.”

Carriker, who works in the AG’s Non-Profit Organizations/Public Charities Division, said the “ah hah moment” of the trial for him came in November during the testimony of former city assessor Joyce Griffin.

Griffin testified about a conversation in the late 1990s with O’Donnell, who at the time, like herself, was a board member of Taunton-based Pro-Home, which offers assistance and information to moderate-income, first-time home buyers.

Griffin said O’Donnell tried convincing her to appeal to the state to recognize Pro-Home as not just a nonprofit 501(c)(3), but also as a charity so that it could “stockpile houses.”

At one point, Griffin said, O’Donnell made her uncomfortable by telling her that “we were both old Irish from Boston who can get things done.”

Carriker said O’Donnell’s habit of using an array of Irish names — such as Walsh, Joyce and Masters — when filing legal documents, and the fact that for years he used a post office box in Dorchester, was his “Achilles heel.”

“It all points to Michael O’Donnell as a Wizard of Oz behind the curtain, pulling strings,” he said.

Davis jokingly interjected that Ching Chang, a persona once associated with O’Donnell’s High Street Extension parcels, was perhaps the exception to the rule when it came to Irish names.

Carriker said O’Donnell has never proven that entities such as Boston Financial Trust and Setter Financial actually transferred or dispersed funds as part of a mortgage being granted.

In the case of the former, a purported loan for $450,000 was issued the same day in 2002 that an O’Donnell nonprofit called Save the Star bought the Star Theater for $154,400 from Jeffrey Antine.

O’Donnell, who represented himself pro se in court, asked for and was denied a mistrial.

He not only complained his creditability had been impeached because he had not testified, he also acknowledged that he’d asserted his right not to testify to avoid self-incrimination under the protection of the Fifth Amendment.

“What do I take from that Mr. O’Donnell?” Davis asked.

O’Donnell also debated with Davis what constitutes a charitable organization and said that until recently he “didn’t realize what a 501(c)(3) is.”

O’Donnell became agitated when the judge told him he was doubling a $1,000 “sanction” — previously ordered for failing to appear at a status hearing in Suffolk Superior Court — to $2,000.

If not paid by the end of Friday, Davis said, he would increase it to $3,000 on Monday and would add an additional $1,000 for each week O’Donnell ignores the order, which was first ordered on Dec. 4.

O’Donnell argued that the order applied only to each day he doesn’t appear. He also said he sent a woman to pay the debt but that a court clerk would not accept the check, and that he went to the court of appeals but had no document to prove it.

When at one point he raised his voice to the judge, Davis laughed and said, “I win the shouting matches. Don’t question me.”

O’Donnell said there has been “a pattern” of persecution by fire department and other officials not just in Taunton but in Mansfield, where in the 1990s a property he owned at 233 Plain St. was destroyed by arson.

“They say I fraudulently loan money (but) they end up seizing it,” he said.

Carriker said the testimony by former state police fire investigator David Domingos was illuminative of how O’Donnell created a web of fictitious names and aliases in order to buy properties “for a song” and, in doing so, misled officials who might otherwise question his real estate transactions.

Domingos said O’Donnell would assign a fictitious mortgage to a specific property, wait for an inquiry from a potential buyer and then claim there’s an attached lien and mortgage before making an offer to sell for much more than he himself had paid, usually at foreclosure.

Former Taunton assistant solicitor Jordan Fiore said that jibes with what he remembers O’Donnell once telling him about the Star Theater, and how O’Donnell was willing to wait until the city made a move to seize the building by eminent domain.

“He said show me the money and I’m out of here,” Fiore said.

Judge Davis said he expects it will take more than two weeks for him to review the materials and issue a judgement.

But Davis also said he considered it “a high priority” to render a ruling as quickly as possible.