Henrico CA Shannon Taylor bribery investigation extinguishes her Attorney General bid.
Henrico Commonwealth Attorney Shannon Taylor was forced to withdraw from the Virginia Attorney General elections as FBI investigations into bribery allegations continue to expand into further cash payments made.
The FBI investigation alleges that Commonwealth Attorney Shannon Taylor took payments through her campaign contributions in order to prevent an extradition of a international drug fugitive, who had thirteen grand jury indictments for conspiracy to distribute cocaine and allegedly was the hub of a 600 kilo cocaine syndicate in the Richmond area.
The alleged bribes were paid to Shannon Taylor's campaign over a span of seven years, started with the first involvement into the international fugitives case.
The alleged drug fugitive is listed in Henrico Court records as Nickolas G. Spanos, whose case has been passed down from three generations of Henrico Commonwealth Attorneys, and is still active in the Henrico Circuit court for over 21 years.
The alleged monies were paid by Victor A. Shaheen, local real estate attorney and Edmond T. Deeb, a food salesman.
Edmond T. Deeb, who was a co-conspirator of Spanos, plead guilty to distribution of cocaine in 1999.
Local sources state that Nickolas Spanos, Victor Shaheen and Edmond Deeb were all close friends for many decades, Victor Shaheen represented the Spanos family in various real estate matters and other cases. The three were socially connected in various activities.
The alleged bribes are listed on Shannon Taylor's campaign disclosure, https://www.vpap.org/candidates/77899/top_donors/
The known payments are listed as:
Victor A. Shaheen - $14,500 total
$1,000 7/13/2012
$1,000 3/22/2013
$5,000 8/2/2015
$5,000 9/5/2018
$2500 2/20/2020
Edmond T. Deeb - $500 total
$500 3/24/2014
The September 05, 2018 $5,000 contribution coincidentally is on the same day as the fugitive's birthday.
All but one of the contributions are given in non-election years, Shannon Taylor campaigned in 2011, 2015 & 2019.
Victor A. Shaheen's contributions are the 2nd highest campaign contributor, the Democratic party of Virginia being first. It also shows that Shaheen's contributions were 14% of the total legal community contribution.
Victor A. Shaheen is not listed as a standing member of the Democratic party or has been active in politics, Shaheen specialises in real estate law. Victor Shaheen has been practising law for over 30 years.
The irregular high amounts of the campaign donations by Victor Shaheen had surpassed 20-30 times a "normal campaign contribution" by large law firms.
A FBI official added that "no one gives that large of a campaign contribution unless you are buying favours, even Shannon Taylor only contributed $7000 to her own campaign".
The FBI has been interviewing Henrico county commonwealth attorneys that have worked on the Nickolas Spanos case, it is unknown if they are under investigation. Henrico Circuit court documents show that Assistant Commonwealth Attorney Michael Y. Feinmel was assigned to the failed extradition attempt in Greece and had made several key mistakes in submitting the extradition request to Greek DOJ officials which lead to
a Greek tribunal dismissing the July 30, 2014 extradition request submitted by Henrico county and released fugitive Nickolas Spanos.
The criminal complaint states that the fugitive was arrested in the Philippines in October 18, 2012 but Shannon Taylor refused to cooperate with Philippine DOJ authorities to have the fugitive extradited.
The Philippines DOJ had made several requests to Shannon Taylor to send extradition documents, so that the fugitive would be extradited to Virginia to face the thirteen grand jury indictments for conspiracy to distribute cocaine.
Despite Shannon Taylor having the grand jury indictments unsealed on November 02, 2012, Shannon Taylor never filed a formal extradition request and ignored Manilla U.S. Embassy FBI requests demanding that she move forward with an extradition or the fugitive would be deported back to his safe haven of Greece.
Since Shannon Taylor never sent extradition documents and would not cooperate with the Philippines DOJ officials, having no choice, Philippine officials deported Spanos back to Greece. Spanos has dual nationality of American and Greek.
The FBI official declared that Nickolas Spanos had offered to turn himself in to Shannon Taylor numerous times, communicated through U.S. Embassy FBI officials in Athens, Greece and through the Richmond U.S. Attorneys office, but Shannon Taylor refused to transport Spanos back to Virginia. FBI officials became suspicious when Taylor refused to cooperate in bringing the fugitive back to Virginia.
In an interview with the Henrico Citizen, Shannon Taylor states that her reason for withdrawing her Attorney General bid was "I must focus on the critical issues happening in Henrico from criminal justice reform to addressing longstanding systemic racism in our society,”
