Lawyer: 2 will admit fraud fueled luxury lifestyle

[May 13, 2008]  PHILADELPHIA (AP) -- Presumably, she didn't fleece Prince Charles. But a couple of young jet-setters plan to admit in court that other people who crossed their paths unwittingly financed their luxury lifestyle.

A lawyer for Jocelyn Kirsch, 22, said Monday that she and her now-ex-boyfriend have signed federal plea agreements that likely will send them to prison for several years for ID theft and other crimes.

Since her arrest, Kirsch's friends and classmates at Drexel University have portrayed her as a serial liar who even masked her identity when she met the heir to the British throne at a student forum in Philadelphia last year; in a favorite myth, she told him she was Lithuanian.

When Kirsch and Edward K. Anderton, 25, were arrested in December, photos found on a laptop in their $3,000-a-month apartment showed the couple smooching under the Eiffel Tower, riding horseback on a beach and flaunting skimpy red swimsuits by a swanky hotel pool.

They stole credit-card and bank-account information from friends, co-workers and neighbors to finance lavish purchases and travel, prosecutors said. They were arrested when they claimed a package at a local UPS store under a neighbor's ID. The package contained lingerie from a British retailer.

"They were just so arrogant," Philadelphia Detective Terry Sweeney, the lead investigator, said Monday. "When you start committing ID theft around the corner from where you live, it's going to come back to haunt you."

Anderton, who graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 2005 with an economics degree, also set up eBay accounts with various stolen identities to buy and sell nonexistent goods, authorities said. That scheme alone netted $33,000, U.S. Attorney Patrick Meehan said.

State charges against the pair were dismissed as federal charges were filed Monday by way of an information, which often indicates a defendant's cooperation.

Kirsch's lawyer, Ronald Greenblatt, said his client signed an agreement to plead guilty to two counts of aggravated identity theft, money laundering, bank fraud and other charges. The sentencing guideline range is about five years.

Anderton also signed a plea deal, Greenblatt said. Anderton's lawyer, Larry Krasner, did not return messages left with The Associated Press on Monday.

Kirsch is living with her mother in Novato, Calif., while Anderton, who had a $60,000-a-year starter job in real-estate finance, is back home with his family in Everett, Wash.

"She's supposed to be graduating college now, and instead she's going to be going down to federal court in a few weeks and entering a plea," Greenblatt said.

[Associated Press; By MARYCLAIRE DALE]

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