Two People Charged with Grand Larceny in the Third Degree and Coercion in the Third Degree
Orange County District Attorney David M. Hoovler announced that Ally Thueson, 32, of Montgomery, and Elizabeth Sloanhoffer, 33, also of Montgomery, were arrested by the multi-agency Orange County White Collar Crime Task Force and charged with Grand Larceny in the Third Degree and Coercion in the Third Degree. As the charges were not bail eligible, both defendants were released with an appearance ticket to return to the Village of Montgomery court on a later date.
As alleged in charges filed in court, the defendants, acting individually and in concert with one another, extorted $9,000 from Thueson’s employer by threatening to make false public statements via the internet which would materially harm the victim’s business.
The multi-agency Task Force, which includes investigators from the Orange County District Attorney’s Office, the Orange County Sheriff’s Office, the New York State Department of Financial Services, the New York State Department of Taxation and Finance and several other local police agencies including the Town of Newburgh Police Department, the Village of Warwick Police Department, the Village of Goshen Police Department and the Town of Woodbury Police Department, was created in March 2023 to focus on enhancing the investigation and prosecution of public corruption and financial crimes. The Task Force’s mandate includes the investigation of residential contractor fraud; crimes involving public integrity, public corruption, and ethics violations; embezzlement and other complex theft cases, crimes against revenue; wage theft and labor law violations.
District Attorney Hoovler thanked the members of the Task Force for the investigation which led to the arrest of the defendants.
“Small business owners deserve to operate free of coercive threats of reputational harm,” said District Attorney David M. Hoovler. “These alleged criminal acts are the exact types of crimes that often go unreported and are uncovered by the hard work of the Task Force. The effectiveness of these types of investigations is driven by the cooperative and skilled work of the investigators who root out crimes that might otherwise go undetected.”
The case is being prosecuted by Chief Trial Assistant District Attorney Richard Moran.
A criminal charge is merely an allegation by the police that a defendant has committed a violation of the criminal law, and it is not evidence of guilt. All defendants are presumed innocent and entitled to a fair trial, during which it will be the State of New York’s burden to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.
