Utah man pleads innocent to defrauding band

Friday, June 13, 2014

FORT SMITH -- A Utah man pleaded innocent Monday in U.S. District Court to swindling Fort Smith Southside High School band members out of money they paid for a 2012 once-in-a-lifetime trip to Hawaii.

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Calliope "Ope" Rocky Saaga, 40, of Saratoga Springs, Utah, entered the plea in U.S. District Court to three counts of wire fraud as a courtroom full of Southside students, parents and school officials looked on.

The fraud counts relate to payments of $67,500, $120,000 and $85,000 the band members and their families wired to a bank account Saaga controlled in 2011 and 2012 to make the arrangements for the trip, according to the indictment issued against Saaga last month in western Arkansas.

U.S. Magistrate James Marschewski scheduled Saaga's trial for July 28 before U.S. District Judge P.K. Holmes III. He appointed the federal public defender's office to represent Saaga.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Webb told the students and parents after the arraignment that the trial could be delayed because of the large amount of records and documents the defense will have to review to prepare for trial.

In the meantime, Marschewski allowed Saaga to be released on a $10,000 signature bond with several conditions. He said he believed Saaga to be a flight risk but that the conditions placed on him would ensure his appearance for his trial.

Webb said he thinks Saaga is an American citizen with ties to western Samoa.

The band members and their families asked several questions of Webb after the arraignment, such as why the bond was so low, whether they would get their money back, whether they could attend the trial and whether Saaga had a gambling habit.

Webb replied he believed part of the government's case would be showing that Saaga had a gambling problem. He also said that while the bond amount was low, the bond conditions were more important in ensuring Saaga showed up for trial. He couldn't say whether the people would get their money back from Saaga.

Marschewski told the audience members that he realized they would prefer that Saaga remain in custody pending his trial. But he said that Saaga was eligible to be released because he had no criminal record and has complied with the conditions of his release so far.

Many of the bond conditions on Saaga were set when he was arrested by federal authorities in Utah last month and when he went before a magistrate in federal court in Springfield, Mo., on a similar case in western Missouri, Marschewski said.

He said Saaga is under home detention and is wearing an electronic monitoring device. He told Saaga that he was not to travel outside of western Arkansas or western Missouri without permission of the federal probation office. He surrendered his passport in Utah.

Marschewski also ordered Saaga not to gamble.

Saaga's wife, Leone, is an employee of Delta Airlines, and Marschewski made her responsible for her husband's behavior while out on bond. He ordered her not to make any air travel arrangements for her husband or she could be liable for criminal action.

Saaga is accused of taking the money paid by 275 Southside band members and their parents and chaperones using two companies he owned, Performing Hawaii Tours LLC and Present America Tours LLC. Saaga had worked with the school in planning trips to Hawaii in 2006 and 2009, school officials have said.

On the same day Saaga was indicted in western Arkansas last month, he also was indicted in western Missouri. In the Missouri case, Saaga is charged with 12 counts of wire fraud and three counts of money laundering.

In that indictment, Saaga is accused of accepting $360,000 from the Willard, Mo., High School Band Boosters to provide travel arrangements for a June 2012 band trip but using the money for himself.

The Arkansas attorney general's office sued Saaga in 2012 in Pulaski County Circuit Court on behalf of the Southside band group and the Spirit of Arkansas Marching Band in eastern Arkansas.

Court records show that in June 2013, Circuit Judge Collins Kilgore issued a default judgment against Saaga and ordered him to pay $3.86 million, which represented a $10,000 civil penalty on each of 386 violations of the Arkansas Deceptive Trade Practices Act for the 386 persons who had paid money that Saaga received.

Kilgore also ordered Saaga to pay $407,003.93 restitution to the two band groups, according to the court records.

Metro on 06/13/2014