A St. Thomas man awaiting trial on 10 counts of embezzlement has been slapped with three additional embezzlement charges, the result of allegations that people paid his travel agency thousand of dollars for airline tickets but never received them.
Robert Starr of Altona was arrested Friday in connection with the latest incidents which bring to 15 the number of charges pending against him. The new charges were added to 10 similar charges filed last July when he was initially arrested by agents of the V.I. Justice Department.
According to an affidavit filed by agent Louis Penn Jr., Starr accepted checks worth $2,675 in April from Gloria Berry for travel in December. Starr cashed the checks but Berry never received the airline tickets.
In May and June two employees at the Educational Complex on St. Croix paid Starr almost $8,000 for airline tickets that were never received.
The affidavit Penn filed in support of Starr's arrest also cited another instance where Starr accepted $675 from Linetta David and Eleanor Liburd for round-trip tickets they have never seen.
The 10 counts filed in 1999 against Starr paint a similar scenario. In a few instances, Starr provided clients with one-way instead of the round-trip tickets they paid for.
Starr is expected to appear in Territorial Court at 10:30 a.m. Tuesday for an advice-of-rights hearing. Originally scheduled for Monday, the hearing was postponed by a day because Starr's attorney, Stephen Brusch, was involved in an ongoing trial.