A flashy California hairstylist and his actress-yoga studio owner girlfriend have pleaded guilty to drugging a mentally ill eye doctor with LSD and bilking him out of millions of dollars before he died.
Forty-seven-year-old Anthony Flores, also known as Anton David, and Anna Rene Moore, 40, were indicted earlier this year on 12 federal charges, including conspiracy, identity theft, mail fraud, and money laundering, as they allegedly embezzled $2.7 million from ophthalmologist Dr. Mark Sawusch, 57, and then tried to steal another $20 million after he died in 2018, as CrimeOnline previously reported.
The couple, who are no longer together, wormed their way into Sawusch’s life, convincing him they were his best friends and caretakers, all the while gaining access to his multi-million brokerage account and other financial accounts.
During that time, they isolated Sawusch from friends and family and began pumping him full of drugs, including ketamine, marijuana, and LSD.
The couple, who are no longer together, continued their conniving ways even after Dr. Mark Sawusch, 57, kicked them out of his Malibu home. They moved into a high end hotel, paid for with his money, and watched him on cameras they set up in his home. When he died in May 2018, they promptly moved back into his house and began moving large sums of his money into their own accounts.
The fraud was uncovered when Sawusch’s mother and sister, who live in Florida, filed a lawsuit against couple after Sawusch’s death. Flores and Moore allegedly violated multiple court orders to return the money they stole from the victim in the course of the lawsuit, allegedly “funneling the money through multiple different accounts to thwart the victim’s estate and court-appointed receiver from recouping the money,” the DOJ said. The suit was ultimately settled with Flores and Moore agreeing to pay the estate $1 million, which they have not yet done.
Flores and Moore agreed to plead guilty to seven counts in August. Flores appeared in court to enter his plea to the seven counts, plus two additional counts of wire fraud, the US Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California said.
Moore is scheduled for sentencing on January 22, 2024, and Flores’s hearing is set for February 26, 2024. They both face decades in prison.
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[Featured image: Anthony Flores and Anna Moore dressed as John Lennon and Yoko Ono. Inset: Mark Sawusch/Facebook]
