The deadline by which a Stowe attorney promised to substantiate allegations of sexual misconduct by a Vermont government official has passed, but Russell Barr has yet to produce any evidence of the alleged crime.
Barr, who’s representing foreign investors in a civil suit against the state of Vermont, told reporters on March 23 that he has evidence that a state official was arrested for having sex with a minor, while on official business in China to promote EB-5 projects to prospective investors.
Barr said he would produce evidence of the alleged crime in his next court filing, which was due by the end of Monday.
"We’re going to amend our complaint over the next two weeks, and we’re going to add those allegations," Barr told reporters. "This is information that is emerging, unfolding.”
But that two weeks has come and gone, and the legal brief filed by Barr Monday, in Lamoille County Superior Court, includes no mention of the allegations he made two weeks ago.
And Barr, who had until recently been courting media attention, has not responded to multiple requests for comment.
Barr is representing a group of foreign investors who were defrauded by the massive EB-5 scam in the Northeast Kingdom. Those investors say the state was negligent in its oversight of the ill-fated EB-5 projects, and is therefore complicit in what federal regulators characterized as a Ponzi-scheme.
Barr said the arrest of a government official while on official EB-5 business in China spotlighted the scope of the state’s malfeasance in its EB-5 oversight duties.
But the supporting evidence Barr promised to deliver by Monday is, as of now, nowhere to be seen.
Attorney General TJ Donovan and Commissioner of Public Safety Thomas Anderson say an internal investigation into the allegations of sexual misconduct found no evidence that a crime ever occurred. Donovan and Anderson have said if Barr is in possession of evidence of a crime, he should turn it over to state officials.
Update 3:18 p.m. The quote from Barr was added to this post.
