A federal grand jury charged V.I. Port Authority Executive Director Carlton Dowe with multiple counts of bank fraud, making false statements on a loan application and aggravated identity theft in an indictment filed with the U.S. District Court of Puerto Rico on March 12 and unsealed Friday.
Dowe was released from custody after appearing before U.S. Magistrate Judge Alan Teague Friday morning at the federal courthouse on St. Thomas, where he also surrendered his passport.
According to the indictment, which can be read below, Dowe has been accused of including false information on loan documents submitted to Banco Popular between March 2021 and November 2023. The allegedly false information included an assertion on one loan application that he expected to receive monthly, $4,500 rent payments for a property “when in truth and fact, as the defendant well knew,” the purported renter “was not leasing any property from the defendant.” In that instance, Dowe was also charged with forging the person’s name and signature on a loan document.
Dowe has been accused of inventing monthly, $15,500 rent payments from at least one other supposed tenant on three other occasions in 2023.
Reached by the Source Friday morning, VIPA Board Chair Willard John told the Source that Dowe had “recently” informed the board of his intent to retire on April 10. John said the board was unaware of any legal proceedings involving Dowe at the time of his notice and that they were “finding out this morning like everyone else.” He added that the board would confer with its legal counsel to determine whether Dowe remained eligible to receive pay in light of the arrest. Later Friday, John said Dowe will remain on sick leave until his retirement.
Dowe’s appearance in federal court Friday came two decades after he was found not guilty of federal wire fraud charges following an alleged scheme to duplicate government payments. He went on to serve in the Virgin Islands Legislature before taking the top job at VIPA in 2013. According to reporting at the time, he was fired in late 2016 in part because of rumors that he might run for governor.
His name has also repeatedly appeared in communications released amid the territory’s Jeffrey Epstein-related lawsuits and the millions of so-called “Epstein Files” released by the U.S. Justice Department this year.
In one March 2017 email Epstein sent to Cecile de Jongh, the territory’s former first lady and his longtime employee, Epstein asked if “john” was “thinking of running again.”
“No,” de Jongh replied on March 12, “although he is getting a lot of encouragement (pressure) to do so since Carlton dropped out. Carlton dropped out because Mapp/Walker threatened to arrest him. Many don’t see Albert Bryan as a viable candidate but he seems to have the backing of Erika and her partner, Greg.”
Gov. Kenneth Mapp appointed Claude Walker acting attorney general in August 2015, and the Legislature confirmed his appointment four months later. Tax and business attorney Erika Kellerhals represented Epstein locally. She and Greg Ferguson are named partners at the firm Kellerhals Ferguson and Kroblin.
Another file released this year described an interview that former V.I. Attorney General Denise George gave to the Federal Bureau of Investigation in 2023, in which George claimed that Gov. Albert Bryan Jr. became increasingly frustrated with her lawsuit against Epstein’s estate. George told the FBI that she believed Bryan sent Dowe to convince her to settle the lawsuit.
According to George’s characterization of that conversation, Dowe said that he “does things for [Bryan] too but has a line he won’t cross.”
