Accusedkiller'sfake Amazon pay stubs prompt latest review of CT probation monitoring system

Aug. 13—Hartford detectives investigating the Aug. 6 killing learned that Williams-Bey was fired from his job at Amazon last November, the warrant said.

State Judicial Branch officials said the agency is reviewing the incident since a defendant under its purview was involved in "serious criminal activity."

After examining the pay stubs, the state Department of Labor concluded that Williams-Bey provided the probation officer with falsified stubs after he was terminated. The Judicial Branch's Court Support Services Division, which oversees probation and pretrial release, were notified Thursday that the pay stubs were fake, officials said.

"Moving forward, CSSD will review its policies and procedures to determine how best to prevent this situation from occurring given the ease by which these pay stubs can be fraudulently reproduced," officials said in an email.

A spokesperson for Amazon said the company is looking to confirm Williams-Bey's dates of employment. Judicial Branch officials said an investigation found that Williams-Bey started the Amazon job on Oct. 13, 2022 and was fired five weeks later on Nov. 20, 2022. Officials have not said why he was terminated.

It wasn't the first time probation supervision provided by CSSD has been reviewed this year.

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A probation officer never confirmed or visited what turned out to be a fake address for a Stamford felon who is suspected of killing his 2-year-old son in January until the man had been off the grid for months, court documents show.

Edgar Ismalej-Gomez was on probation after serving a 60-day prison sentence for abusing his son, Liam Rivera, in 2021 when the child was about 6 months old, arrest warrants said. A protective order prohibited Ismalej-Gomez from having contact with the child, but he was living with the boy and a baby at their mother's home when the homicide occurred, court documents said.

The child's mother, Iris Rivera-Santos, has since been arrested after police said she lied to them about how the boy's body was found in a plastic bag buried in a Stamford park.

An investigation determined the probation officer failed to confirm Ismalej-Gomez's address within the Judicial Branch's required timeframe, according to Gary Roberge, executive director of CSSD.

After a review of the incident, however, Judicial Branch officials determined no probation policy changes were needed.

Williams-Bey was being monitored by a CSSD probation officer while he was free on bond in connection with several cases, including a 2021 assault. He avoided a previous murder charge for a 2021 killing when forensic testing showed evidence didn't connect him with the crime, court documents showed.

He was placed on Intensive Pretrial Supervision as part of the terms of his release on bond in the other cases. The standard Intensive Pretrial Supervision program requires defendants to be on radio frequency monitoring, which tracks when and if a person is compliant with an established home curfew — including house arrest in Williams-Bey's case — and if the monitoring unit has been tampered with, officials said.

Williams-Bey faced the typical requirements of the program, including house arrest unless he was working, at a medical appointment, at court or at a legal appointment, Judicial Branch officials said. The program also requires defendants to undergo weekly drug testing and attend weekly face-to-face visits with their probation officer, officials said. In addition, other specific terms of release can be imposed by a judge, Judicial Branch officials said.

As part of the conditions of employment while supervised, Williams-Bey was required to continually provide his probation officer with verification that he was working when his monitoring unit showed he wasn't home, the reports indicated. The probation reports show Williams-Bey "worked" at the Amazon warehouse overnight Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays. The stipulation meant he needed to be out of his house during those hours or the monitoring system would alert probation officials he wasn't working.

The Hartford homicide last weekend occurred when Williams-Bey was supposed to be working. Since the monitoring device Williams-Bey was wearing only indicated whether or not he was home and did not track his specific movements, it would have appeared he was in compliance with the conditions of his release at the time of the killing, officials said.

Connecticut probation officers are not required to contact companies to verify employment if it's a condition of release or probation, Judicial Branch officials said. But it's left to the probation officer to determine the most appropriate way to confirm employment, officials said.

"Probation officers are not required to call companies on a regular basis to determine if their clients are still employed," officials said in an email.

Under the standard supervision program, Williams-Bey was also subject to monthly home visits to verify his address and living conditions. Judicial Branch officials confirmed the home visits occurred.

The probation officer supplied court officials with a detailed report of Williams-Bey's activities prior to each time he was to face a judge. Judicial Branch officials said probation officers also keep records on an internal system cannot be released to the public.

Although his arrest warrant for the Aug. 6 homicide indicated Williams-Bey was fired last November from his overnight warehouse job, he continued to submit Amazon pay stubs to the probation officer as verification that he was still at the company for months, the reports showed.

The last probation report was filed on June 8, about a week before he was to appear in court on the list of cases.

"Mr. Williams-Bey remains employed at Amazon Warehouse where he works Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays," probation officer Sylma Pagan wrote in the June 8 report. "He provides verification of employment regularly by way of pay stubs."

Williams-Bey also regularly submitted work schedules and pay stubs for a home care services job, the reports showed.

The reports indicated that Williams-Bey for the most part was in compliance with the terms of the Intensive Pretrial Supervision.

Two days after Williams-Bey was accused of killing 24-year-old Jordan Phillips on Wethersfield Avenue, Hartford Mayor Luke Bronin called for reforms in the way pretrial defendants are monitored.

"We learned the day of the shooting that he was fired from Amazon back in November, so that's nine months since he held that job and it was nine months when he was out in the community and putting the community at-risk," Bronin said during a news conference announcing gun violence initiatives.

Bronin called for a review of the system overseeing violent offenders and said the Williams-Bey case exposes weaknesses in the oversight of pending criminal cases.

"He was supposed to be under intense pretrial supervision, but it's clear that there wasn't much supervision, let alone intense supervision, and he really shouldn't have been out at all," Bronin said.

His probation officer confirmed to police that Williams-Bey was not home at the time of the shooting, according to an arrest warrant. Judicial Branch officials said any time "a defendant is involved in serious criminal activity, CSSD reviews the case thoroughly."

Staff writers Matt Knox and Ken Dixon contributed to this story.