Scam To Defraud Incapacitated Delco Sends VA Man To Prison

DELAWARE COUNTY, PA — A man who was charged along with his now deceased sister in a scheme to defraud elderly incapacitated people in Delaware County was hit with a five-and-a-half-year prison sentence.

United States Attorney Jacqueline C. Romero said Carlton Rembert, 70, of Hampton, VA, was sentenced to 66 months in prison and five years of supervised release. He was also ordered to pay 534,335 in restitution to the victims, and a $400 special assessment for his role in a scheme to defraud elderly incapacitated people of over $1 million.

Rembert’s late co-conspirator and sister, Gloria Byars, of Aldan, was a court-appointed guardian for over 100 incapacitated wards in Delaware County. Byars owned and operated Global Guardian Services in Lansdowne.

Between 2012 and 2018, Byars, Rembert, and other co-conspirators stole the life savings from dozens of wards while Byars served as their court-appointed guardian.

Byars pleaded guilty to conspiracy, wire fraud, money laundering, and tax fraud for her role in the fraud scheme.

Rembert went to trial in November 2023 and after a four-day trial, a jury found Rembert guilty of conspiracy, bank fraud, and wire fraud.

As guardian, Byars had unfettered access to wards’ property including bank accounts, pensions, real estate, retirement accounts, and other assets. Byars stole money from the wards’ bank accounts by writing unauthorized checks to companies she controlled, or to shell companies controlled by her co-conspirators, Rembert and Alesha Mitchell.

Rembert and Mitchell assisted Byars in the theft by opening bank accounts in their home state of Virginia in the names of shell companies purporting to be medical services companies. Byars made the checks payable to her co-conspirators’ fake medical services companies, to make it appear that the elderly incapacitated ward incurred a legitimate medical expense.

After receiving dozens of checks from his sister, Rembert deposited over $695,000 in stolen ward checks into five separate shell business bank accounts he had opened. Rembert then withdrew over $388,000 in cash through 94 structured withdrawals.

Rembert also obtained $217,082 in certified checks, sending the certified checks to Byars and keeping a share of the stolen ward money for himself.

When confronted by law enforcement, Rembert lied to investigators, pretending that he provided services to the elderly and sick victims.

Some of the victims’ families testified at Rembert’s trial, telling the court that they had never heard of Rembert’s sham medical companies, and that neither Rembert nor his companies provided any services for their loved ones.

Rembert and Byars spent the stolen ward money on personal expenses, including vacations, clothing and other retail purchases, restaurants, vehicles, gifts, and parties.

In all, Byars, Rembert, and Mitchell stole well over $1 million from at least 120 incapacitated people in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, which includes Delaware County

Mitchell is scheduled to be sentenced on Oct. 24.

The Philadelphia Inquirer reported Byars' death in August this year, saying she was found dead days after a judge rescheduled her sentencing hearing due to her being hospitalized.

Byars and two others in 2019 were charged by the Delaware County District Attorney's Office with theft by unlawful taking, theft by deception, theft by receiving stolen property, theft by failure to make required disposition of funds, and conspiracy in a similar investigation.

"Carlton Rembert, together with his co-conspirator Gloria Byars, abused the trust of the most vulnerable among us – individuals who have been incapacitated by age, illness, or both. What they did was truly heinous – and truly criminal," Delaware County District Attorney Jack Stollsteimer said. I applaud United States Attorney Romero for prosecuting these individuals, in one of the first guardianship fraud cases to be prosecuted. Unfortunately, this type of fraud is increasing, and it is important for law enforcement to send a clear signal that it will not be tolerated."