Montco Man Pleads Guilty To Defrauding Hopeful Holy Land Pilgrims
By Steve Tawa
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- There were major developments today in an "unholy" fraud case -- an Elkins Park, Pa. man accused of selling Christian pilgrimage trips that didn't exist.
At the federal courthouse in Philadelphia today, 74-year-old John Baird pleaded guilty to scamming 138 church members, mostly elderly and retired, out of a total of $423,000.
The victims thought they were to go on seven different trips, to pilgrimage sites in Europe and the Middle East, places like Rome, Israel, France, Greece, and Turkey.
Those trips, in 2004 and 2007, never materialized, nor did those customers get their money back.
If the case had gone to trial, prosecutors would have presented evidence that Baird went to churches and even recruited unwitting priests and other religious leaders to sign up church members.
Each of the four mail fraud counts carries a potential maximum of twenty years in prison. Baird will be sentenced in May.
