Federal prosecutors on Thursday charged former state Sen. and state Democratic Party chair Karen Carter Peterson with a single count of wire fraud, accusing her of illegally helping herself to tens of thousands of dollars of campaign and party funds with the help of at least four associates, our media partners at the Times Picayune/The Advocate report.
Her lawyer, Brian Capitelli, confirmed to the newspapers that she has signed a plea deal.
Peterson and Capitelli have said that Peterson's gambling addiction is at the root of her crimes. Her gambling issues became public in 2019, when WWL-TV reported that she had received a misdemeanor summons for violating a self-imposed ban on entering casinos, the papers report.
In April of this year, she abruptly resigned near the start of the legislative session, citing personal problems. At the time, she said she had “participated in and successfully received inpatient and outpatient treatment for depression and addiction,” and that she had avoided gambling for “a long time,” the papers report.
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