Disbarred lawyer sought for arrest on theft charges

District Judge David Barker issued the warrant for Charles Radosevich, 62, after he failed to show up in court last week on the eve of his trial.

Chief Deputy District Attorney Mike Staudaher said he believes Radosevich, who is disbarred in Colorado and Nebraska, has fled the state. His trial, which was set to begin on Monday, was canceled.

If Radosevich had showed up in court last week, prosecutors would have sought to revoke his bail amid allegations he was forging documents and stealing money from unsuspecting clients — even after being charged in April.

The scheme is alleged to involve preparing authentic-looking, but phony, court documents that can include forged signatures of judges and time stamps. Sometimes, Radosevich, who isn’t licensed to practice in Nevada, assumes the professional identification number of a licensed lawyer on the documents.

“He’s continuing to act as an attorney without a license, and he’s continuing to harm people,” Staudaher said.

Chief Deputy District Attorney Bernie Zadrowski, who investigated legal services Radosevich provided in a related bad check case, said Radosevich remains a “threat to the public.”

The Nevada State Bar, which is assisting prosecutors in the case against Radosevich, has been watching his unlicensed activities for a decade, ever since it got him to sign a court-approved agreement in 2000 promising, among other things, not to provide legal services in divorce, personal injury, immigration and bankruptcy cases.

At the request of the bar, prosecutors first filed criminal charges against Radosevich in October, and added new charges in April after learning about more victims from IRS agents. The charges involve about a dozen victims.

On Monday, a woman answering the phone at Radosevich’s office at 3470 E. Russell Road said he no longer maintained the office. The woman said she was told to refer all calls for Radosevich to an IRS agent.

The agent, John Kirk, declined comment. He referred a reporter to David Barnes, a spokesman for the Washington-based Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration, an independent agency within the Treasury Department that has oversight of the IRS and tax preparers.

Barnes also declined to comment.

One of Radosevich’s biggest victims, Southern California real estate agent Michelle Geris, ended up being arrested blocks from her home in August 2009 after Radosevich is alleged to have pocketed $53,000 she gave him to pay off a gambling debt to Green Valley Ranch Station.

Radosevich was supposed to give the money to Zadrowski’s bad check unit, which planned to turn it over to Green Valley Ranch and then dismiss the criminal debt case against Geris. But when the bad check unit did not receive the $53,000, it obtained a warrant for her arrest. Zadrowski said the Geris case is on hold as a result of Radosevich’s criminal troubles.

Radosevich is also charged with stealing nearly $140,000 from the estate of the mother of Darlene Lonzaga and her brother, Jimmy Montgomery. In that case, Radosevich is alleged to have circulated a phony court document with the forged signature of District Judge Elizabeth Gonzalez as part of the effort to swindle the brother and sister out of the estate money.

With the help of the State Bar, prosecutors recently learned that Radosevich might have forged a court document in a new theft scam, which isn’t part of the charges filed against him.

In a Sept. 3 sworn affidavit for the bar, Marco and Reina Navarro charged that Radosevich stole $1,000 they had given him to file a Chapter 7 bankruptcy petition that he never filed.

The Navarros said Radosevich provided them with a copy of what appeared to be a U.S. Bankruptcy Court document indicating that their petition was filed May 13. But the document, which purported to have a case number and an assignment to U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Mike Nakagawa, turned out to be a fake.

Bankruptcy Court officials told both the Navarros and prosecutors that they have no record of the bankruptcy case, and they referred the couple to the Legal Aid Center of Southern Nevada for help.

“Your first reaction is how incredibly brazen it is to continue this scheme despite being in the cross hairs of the district attorney’s office and others,” said Barbara Buckley, the nonprofit center’s executive director. “You feel sorry for the victims. They think they’re talking to a licensed attorney, and they’re not.”

Buckley, the assembly’s outgoing speaker, said her agency referred the Navarros to a lawyer to file their bankruptcy case free of charge.

Contact Jeff German at jgerman@reviewjournal.com or 702-380-8135 or read more courts coverage at lvlegalnews.com.