‘Casanova Conman’ sentenced to time served for visa fraud
An Australian national who has been repeatedly accused of swindling women in his home country, including allegedly defrauding his mother, was sentenced to time served on Wednesday, eight months after pleading guilty to visa fraud.
Paul Carter, who had been living in Watervliet under the name Paul Hamilton, was also ordered to pay a $5,000 fine after a short proceeding in U.S. District Court.
Carter, who was born Paul Cristallo, gained the “Casanova Conman” moniker in the Australian press after a September 2019 exposé detailing past accusations of fraud, forgery and failed marriages. When federal agents searched the townhouse he shared with his now-wife last year, they found Australian diplomas under the name Paul Hamilton, a forged letter purporting to confirm his U.S.
citizenship, and a New York driver’s license, among other documents, according to court records.
Carter lied when he tried to a renew an E-2 visa in 2018. That type of visa is given to immigrants who are investing substantial amounts of money in a U.S. business. Carter initially obtained the visa in 2014 when he immigrated to Boston. In his renewal, Carter failed to mention that he had been arrested in 2000 on a marijuana charge in Australia. That charge was dismissed as part of a diversion program.
Though federal prosecutors did not charge Carter with any fraud or forgery crimes, during his sentencing they expressed concerns about the documents discovered in his home and asked U.S. District Judge Thomas Mcavoy to take them into account when sentencing Carter.
In addition to a fake immigration letter approving his U.S. citizenship, they noted that while he came in on a visa designed for wealthy individuals and he had a letter from BNY Mellon bank purporting to give him access to a multimillion dollar trust, he qualified for a federal public defender.
“There’s something a little unsettling about this defendant,” said Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Barnett.
Additionally, a sentencing memo prepared by Carter’s attorneys indicated he had a high school education, but federal agents found two diplomas in his apartment claiming he had business and law degrees from Australian universities. Both degrees used the name Paul Hamilton, a name prosecutors said Carter didn’t use until he came to the United States.
Carter’s attorney, Assistant Federal Public Defender Paul Evangelista, pushed back against the documents being brought up in court on Wednesday, arguing that Carter wasn’t convicted of any crimes connected to those documents.
“How do I challenge these?” he asked Mcavoy. “Do we have a mini-hearing right here?”
After sentencing Carter, the judge gave a lighthearted warning.
“Just be careful choosing who the hell you are,” he told Carter.
It’s unclear what’s next for Carter. Immigration agents were waiting in the courtroom and served him with papers directing him to make an appearance at a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in the next few weeks. That will start removal proceedings but Carter, who has married a U.S. citizen, has already applied to stay in the country.
His wife recently received a job offer in San Diego and the pair have requested permission to relocate there, according to a presentencing memo.
If he was deported, it’s unclear what awaits him in Australia.
Carter allegedly posed as a multimillionaire developer there and would woo women into turning over to him control of their financial assets, according to Australian news reports.
The stories include allegations that he hired a hit man to kill Katherine De Bois, his then-fiancée, after she found out his wife, whom he said died of bone cancer, was alive.
When an Australian television reporter tracked him down at an Albany-area construction site prior to his arrest, Carter denied all the allegations against him.
De Bois later wrote a book about her experiences. Carter has never been charged with any crimes in connection with his alleged fraud in Australia.
Carter has married at least two other women, according to Australian press reports, including a woman who immigrated with him to the United States in 2014. She now runs a business in Rensselaer County.
She declined to speak with the Times Union when contacted in October 2019 and later pleaded guilty to immigration-related charges herself.
The Carters entered the country in 2014 under E-2 investor visas, initially living in Boston, according to a copy of Paul Carter’s visa application obtained by the Times Union and court documents. The pair claimed to own a construction business. At some point, Paul Carter traveled back to Australia and became engaged to De Bois. The occasion was celebrated with a lavish party that she described in her book and which was also chronicled on social media.
But Paul Carter’s activities in the U.S. are what got him in trouble with the federal government. He came back to the U.S. and continued to live with his wife and, in 2018 when their visas were set to expire, they traveled to Toronto to apply for their second E-2 visas. They were denied by the U.S. State Department. However, the pair allegedly took advantage of an immigration law loophole to buy themselves two more years of legal status in the U.S. until May 2020, court records show.
The couple divorced in August 2019. Carter, who never married De Bois, later became engaged and married to Kelly Sayer, the attorney who handled his divorce, according to court documents.
Carter was initially charged April 7, 2021. When agents interviewed Carter, he admitted he had overstayed his visa and was in the process of changing his name to Paul Hamilton, according to the complaint. He pleaded guilty Sept. 15, 2021.
De Bois, who also later moved to the United States, was present for the sentencing. Afterward she said it was the start of a longer process.
“I think he got off lightly,” she said. “But there’s more to come.”