73-year-old declared dead 25 years ago sentenced to probation

A 73-year-old man was sentenced to three years of probation Tuesday and ordered to pay $90,000 in restitution for a fraud charge stemming from having lived 32 years under an assumed identity.

Arthur Gerald Jones pleaded guilty in September to a felony for using a false name to obtain a driver's license or identity card. As part of a deal with prosecutors, Jones avoided trial on several other felony counts, including identity theft, court records show.

Jones was busted in July by state and federal investigators. He was working at the Rampart's sport and race book at the time under an assumed name.

In 1979, Jones fled Chicago and his gambling debts, mob ties and wife and three children. Illinois courts declared him dead 25 years ago, but Jones was living a second life under a new identity.

Investigators began looking at Jones in May 2008, when he went to a Henderson DMV office to renew his driver's license under the name Joseph Richard Sandelli. Jones supplied a Social Security number that belonged to an Arizona man named Clifton Goodenough.

As part of the sentence handed down by District Judge James Bixler, Jones was ordered to pay more than $78,600 to the Social Security Administration for their payments to Jones' family after he was declared dead in Illinois.

Jones was ordered to pay about $11,400 to Goodenough for missed work and legal fees incurred because of the misuse of his Social Security number.

Goodenough, a nurse at a Phoenix veterans hospital, told the Review-Journal in July that he had been embroiled in a longtime feud with the IRS over "extra income" he supposedly had earned in Las Vegas every year since 1995.

The agency had garnisheed his wages, taken funds from his bank account and caused his family substantial annual grief during the long ordeal, he said.

Jones had admitted buying Goodenough's Social Security number for $800 before he left Chicago.

Meanwhile, whether Jones will ever be able to pay back the full $90,000 in restitution is unknown.

Bixler asked Jones how he would pay back the money, court records show.

Jones' attorney, Stephen Stein, said the money would come out of his Social Security benefits. In other words, Jones would pay the majority of restitution to the Social Security Administration from money he received from the Social Security Administration.

Bixler also ordered Jones to perform community service, stay out of trouble and attend counseling.

The case was prosecuted by the state attorney general's office.

Contact reporter Francis McCabe at fmccabe@reviewjournal.com or 702-380-1039.