CONTINUING COVERAGE
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The defense team for the former Warren County politician who is facing dozens of criminal charges attempted to show their client was a victim, just like others who put their faith into Tom Lysaght, who a witness said earlier this week “could sell ice to Eskimos.”
Before Tina Walter started her testimony on Tuesday, her husband, Tom Walter, finished up his time on the witness stand in the criminal trial of Pete Beck.
Walter, who spent nearly nine hours on the witness stand over three days repeatedly said he and other investors were “just trying to seek justice,” “our money was stolen,” and “we had no other recourse” but to file a criminal complaint with the Ohio Division of Securities and file a civil lawsuit against Beck and others.
Defense attorney Ralph Kohnen spent quite a bit of time during his cross-examination of Walter asking why he and his wife decided to invest $150,000 designated for their children’s college fund into a risky start-up tech firm after just one 45-minute meeting with Lysaght and Beck.
Walter is the man who bought forward the criminal complaint against Pete Beck, as well as Lysaght, who died in November 2010, and Combs. He is also the lead plaintiff in a civil suit against the former state lawmaker.
“Talking to Tom Lysaght and reading the brochures, it was an unbelievable concept and ahead of its time,” Walter said concerning the technology being developed by the tech company Christopher Technologies. “We were convinced to invest.”
That was also based on Beck’s comments in that conversation, who Walter and the state say was not only the CFO of Christopher Technologies but also TML Consulting.
Lysaght owned TML Consulting and was hired by the two founders of Christopher Technologies, commonly referenced as C-Tech, John Fussner and Mark Woods, to find investors. Walter, a developer, was working on a house for a client next door to Lysaght’s home commonly referenced as “the castle.” He said after just meeting Lysaght a few times — and turning him down three times — and Beck for just 45 minutes on in early July 2008, he and his wife, Tina, decided to invest.
They eventually invested $360,000 between Christopher Technologies and TML Consulting, and after going through three boxes of records — records given to the Walters by Beck upon request — Tom Walter said his fears of what he, and later his wife on the witness stand, called a Ponzi scheme were realized.
Walter said that Lysaght surrounded himself with professionals, such as Beck who is a CPA and was a prominent politician in Warren County. But when Kohnen asked Walter if he felt Beck was also taken advantage of by Lysaght, he said Lysaght was “surrounding himself with a number of people that gave him credibility and was able to execute quite a scam.”
On re-direct questioning, Senior Assistant Attorney General Dan Kasaris asked Walter, “Do you believe Peter Beck was a victim of Tom Lysaght?”
“No I don’t,” he said.
Walter’s wife, Tina, was only questioned by the state for about a half hour, probably the shortest amount of time a witness had been directly examined by the prosecution. She testified that she did not find out “until the other day” that a Carnival Cruise Line deal — which was touted to be very close to being consummated — was not even close to being reality.
That was the first of a few times she nearly lost control of her emotions.
And if she would have known the company’s liabilities were in excess of $200,000, Tina Walter said, “We would have walked away.”
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