Sean Alfortish(left) and Vanessa Motta
NEW ORLEANS — A federal judge has set a retrial for a disbarred attorney and a co-defendant on murder-related charges in the New Orleans staged-wrecks conspiracy, two weeks after a jury convicted the attorney on fraud and obstruction counts but deadlocked on allegations tied to the killing of an FBI cooperator.
Chief U.S. District Judge Wendy Vitter scheduled the new trial for Sean Alfortish, who also is a former Kenner magistrate judge, and Leon “Chunky” Parker on five counts arising from the 2020 killing of Cornelius Garrison III, who had cooperated with federal investigators examining staged collisions involving tractor-trailers.
The retrial is scheduled for June 7, 2027. On September 3, jurors returned a split verdict in the original trial following nearly four weeks of testimony and more than 30 hours of deliberations.
The jury convicted Alfortish of conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud, two counts of mail fraud, obstruction of justice and witness tampering in the insurance-fraud scheme. But jurors could not reach unanimous verdicts on murder-related charges against Alfortish and Parker. Vitter declared a mistrial on those counts.
Prosecutors have said they intend to try the murder charges again. The unresolved counts accuse the men of conspiring to influence a witness through murder, influencing a witness through murder, conspiring to retaliate against a witness through murder, retaliating against a witness through murder and causing death through the use of a firearm.
Garrison, who was also known as “Slim,” was killed in 2020 after becoming an FBI cooperator in the federal investigation of lawyers, runners and others accused of arranging deliberate crashes involving commercial vehicles and filing or pursuing insurance claims. Prosecutors alleged that Alfortish and Parker acted to prevent Garrison from providing information and testimony to investigators. The defendants have denied the murder allegations.
The jury acquitted Alfortish of another obstruction-of-justice count and a charge alleging he sought to procure false testimony, according to reports on the verdict.
Alfortish remains in custody pending sentencing on the counts for which he was convicted and the retrial, as does Parker, who faces the unresolved homicide-related allegations.
The federal prosecutor’s office said Alfortish’s convictions stemmed from a yearslong scheme to defraud trucking and insurance companies through staged collisions.
The mixed verdict amounted to a major victory for prosecutors in their effort to establish Alfortish directed the sprawling fraud operation.
Garrison, known in the scheme as a “slammer,” had participated in staged wrecks for years before cooperating with the FBI’s Operation Sideswipe investigation. He was shot 10 times in the entryway of his mother’s Gentilly home in September 2020, four days after a federal indictment confirmed his cooperation.
Jurors did not reach verdicts on charges against Alfortish and Parker that included conspiracy to commit witness tampering through murder, witness tampering through murder, conspiracy to retaliate against a witness through murder, retaliation against a witness through murder and causing death through the use of a firearm.
The exact combination of counts varied by defendant, but the deadlock left both men without either convictions or acquittals on the central allegations involving Garrison’s death.
Parker previously pleaded guilty to wire-fraud charges arising from the staged-wreck investigation. The jury reached no verdict on the murder allegations against him.
The fraud convictions followed testimony that Alfortish and his then-fiancée, attorney Vanessa Motta, used a network of drivers, passengers, recruiters and medical providers to exploit crashes with commercial trucks.
Prosecutors said the participants would intentionally sideswipe tractor-trailers, then present passengers as injured drivers or victims. The passengers would be directed to lawyers and medical providers, leading to lawsuits and large settlements against trucking companies and insurers.
The government said Alfortish, who had been disbarred after an earlier fraud conviction, continued to profit by referring cases to Motta’s law practice and using related businesses to collect payments and finance medical procedures. Financial records and witness testimony placed the enterprise at the center of a multimillion-dollar fraud scheme during the late 2010s.
Motta was convicted in March of fraud-related offenses stemming from the staged-wreck investigation. She was not charged in Garrison’s killing.
Federal authorities have charged 63 people in the broader staged-wreck investigation, and more than 50 have pleaded guilty.
The murder case relied heavily on Ryan “Red” Harris, a staged-wreck participant who pleaded guilty to planning Garrison’s killing and testified that Alfortish ordered the hit and Parker pulled the trigger.
Harris testified he arranged meetings between Alfortish and Parker, bought burner phones, scouted Garrison’s home and helped recruit his then-girlfriend, Jovanna Gardner, to lure Garrison outside. Harris said Parker later told him he had killed Garrison and had been paid by Alfortish.
But the government produced no murder weapon, physical evidence or direct electronic communication showing that Alfortish ordered Garrison killed. An FBI agent also acknowledged location evidence did not directly establish Alfortish, Parker and Harris were all present at the same alleged planning meeting.
Defense lawyers argued Harris, who hopes to receive a reduced sentence for cooperation, had the strongest motive to blame others for a crime in which he admitted participating. Parker’s lawyers highlighted Harris’ prior lies to investigators, his involvement in destroying evidence and firearms recovered from locations associated with him.
Gardner testified Harris told her after the shooting he had killed Garrison, though she also said she had seen Parker and Harris together before the killing.
Alfortish remains subject to sentencing on the fraud convictions. The jury acquitted him of separate allegations involving obstruction of justice and subornation of perjury connected to claims he tried to induce a jailed man to provide false testimony.
