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A Cuban resident in Miami was arrested for stealing $600,000 and the home of an elderly woman who was physically and mentally incapacitated, whom he was taking care of, according to a investigation by the Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office.
Nilo Somoano, 62 years old and of Cuban origin -as confirmed by CiberCuba-, has been detained since last week, facing charges of theft from individuals aged 65 or older valued at $50,000 or more, exploitation of elderly individuals exceeding $50,000, and an organized scheme to defraud over $50,000, all first-degree felonies.
The Miami-Dade state attorney, Katherine Fernández Rundle, announced on Thursday the arrest and charges against Somoano, as a result of an investigation into the exploitation of his elderly neighbor, in the Half Moon Towers condominium, located at 5055 NW 7th Street, in the city of Miami.
The victim, who passed away on October 16, 2021, at the age of 89, suffered from severe mental and physical disabilities. Since 2015, the woman had been unable to care for herself and required assistance with all her daily needs, such as bathing, preparing meals, administering medications, and attending medical appointments.
The woman was named Carmela Yolanda Magaraci, revealed a nephew interviewed by Telemundo51. Ricardo Magaraci said that the last time they saw her alive was in 2020.
Magaraci stated that his aunt was "completely out of it." During the week he spent with her in Miami, she only recognized him for one day. "I kept asking her, 'Where are your documents?' and she would reply, 'The man took them, the man took them,'" he recounted.
The elderly woman's family was unable to travel to Miami any further due to the covid-19 pandemic, but when they finally did, they learned that she had passed away in 2021.
The Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office confirmed that Somoano became the victim's guardian "under unclear circumstances."
In January 2016, the man obtained a durable power of attorney that granted him access to the elderly woman's finances, and by virtue of the legal authority conferred by this document, he began to siphon off her money.
But it didn't stop there. She also managed to get the elderly woman to renounce her rights to the apartment and transfer the deed to her while she was still alive and living there.
The statement from the Prosecutor's Office specifies that Somoano has resided in several apartments at Half Moon Towers since 2006 to the present and owns multiple units in the building.
The bank records showed that the accused used the victim's financial accounts to purchase another condominium unit at Half Moon Towers and spent the victim's original monetary assets -$600,000- on multiple activities.
According to the prosecutors, he transferred nearly $14,000 to his wife via Zelle to cover the cremation services for his brother and godmother; he made purchases at Costco, bought hardware and home improvement items at Home Depot, paid for various plumbing services, and shopped at clothing stores, specialty shops, and vehicle supply stores.
Fernández Rundle warned that “none of these services or items could have helped the victim who spent her last days living in an adult facility.”
“The economic exploitation of our elderly residents is almost always a cruel scheme to deprive a person of the benefits of a lifetime of hard work and careful financial planning,” the prosecutor stated. “Using a person's mental and physical frailty as a means to rob them of everything is the kind of crime that neither I nor the investigators nor the staff of the Elder and Vulnerable Adults Unit of the State Attorney's Office will tolerate.”
Somoano was admitted to TGK prison on Thursday, and a bail of $750,000 was set, as reported by NBC6 South Florida.
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