The false heiress Anna Sorokin sentenced for being introduced into a luxury lifestyle

April 26, 2019, 00:52 UTC

By Associated press

NEW YORK – A New York jury on Thursday condemned an extravagant personality who funded a sumptuously plausible lifestyle with tens of thousands of dollars borrowed from banks, hotels and friends who thought they were a rich German heiress.

The Manhattan jury found Anna Sorokin guilty of four counts of robbery of services, three grand laruses and a head of attempted larceny following a monthlong trial that attracted the attention of the international community. She was acquitted of a chief of grand larceny and a leader of grand larceny attempt.

His attorney, Todd Spodek, said that Ms. Sorokin could be sentenced to five to fifteen years' imprisonment for the most serious charge. She should be sentenced on May 9.

Sorokin also risks being deported to Germany because the authorities claim to have exceeded his visa.

Under the name of Anna Delvey, Sorokin cheated friends and financial institutions into believing that she had a fortune of about $ 67 million abroad that would cover her clothes up. luxury hotel stays and transatlantic trips.

She claimed that her father was a diplomat or oil baron and made extraordinary efforts to get others to pay him. Prosecutors alleged that she had promised a friend an all-expenses-paid trip to Morocco, but then stuck her with the $ 62,000 bill. Sorokin had been acquitted of this accusation.

She was also charged with falsifying financial records as part of a $ 22 million loan request to fund a private arts club that she wished to create, with exhibitions, facilities and ephemeral shops, said prosecutors. The loan was denied but she persuaded a bank to lend her $ 100,000 that she did not repay.

Spodek insisted that Sorokin was planning to pay off his six-figure debt and was just "buying time." He described her as an ambitious entrepreneur who had simply put her head forward but had no criminal intent.

Spodek said Sorokin was "upset, as everyone would be," following the verdict. But he was delighted that Sorokin was acquitted of one of the most serious charges in the indictment: having tried to steal more than a million dollars at City National Bank.

The verdict followed two days of often tedious deliberations, during which the jurors sought repeated clarifications on the law and, in a note to the judge, indicated that they had reached a "dead end" because of 39, one juror without compromise. In another note on Thursday, jurors said they were "unable to reach a unanimous verdict because we basically disagree".