For a second time this year, jurors get a chance to decide if a Colorado businessman helped turn an online fundraiser to build a wall along the U.S. southern border into a cash cow for its creators.
FILE - Timothy Shea exits Manhattan federal court after his court case was declared a mistrial on June 7, 2022, in New York. A lawyer for Shea, accused of cheating donors to a $25 million fund to build a wall along the southern U.S. border, told jurors on Tuesday, Oct. 25, 2022, that they should question why his client's fraud trial is being held in New York, tapping into a theme that may have contributed to an earlier trial ending with a deadlocked jury.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Molly Bracewell told jurors in her closing that fraud was in the game plan as soon as Shea and three others, including ex-President Donald Trump’s onetime adviser Steve Bannon, thought of creating the fundraising plan in late 2018. Bracewell said Shea even steered money into his energy drink company, Winning Energy, which sells cans that have featured a cartoon superhero image of Trump and claim to contain “12 oz. of liberal tears.”