Skip to footer

'No. 1 deadbeat parent' in jail after 11 years on the run

No. 1 deadbeat parent: The New York dad who prosecutors call the 'No. 1 deadbeat parent' pleaded guilty Thursday to owing more than $1.2 million to three children from two failed marriages.

|
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services / AP Photo
Robert Sand, labeled the 'No. 1 deadbeat parent' by prosecutors, pleaded guilty today to owing more than $1.2 million to three children from two failed marriages.
  • By Frank Eltman Associated Press

| CENTRAL ISLIP, N.Y.

A New York man once dubbed by prosecutors as the government's most-wanted deadbeat parent pleaded guilty Thursday to owing more than $1.2 million to three children from two failed marriages.

Robert Sand, 50, pleaded guilty in US District Court in Central Islip on Long Island to two counts of failing to pay child support. Assistant US Attorney Alan Bode said in court that the child support orders, which were issued on Long Island, have been in arrears since at least 2002.

The figure cited by Mr. Bode includes interest and penalties. The prosecutor declined to comment to reporters after the court proceeding.

Mr. Sand told the judge he fled first to Florida and then to Thailand. Sand's attorney, Glenn Obedin, said his client had grown tired of living on the run and contacted authorities late last year.

Sand left Thailand, where he had worked in an assortment of odd jobs, and flew to the Philippines. He was arrested and then deported from the Philippines in November 2012 because he lacked proper identification, prosecutors said. He was sent to Los Angeles, where he was arrested by federal marshals, and then extradited to New York, where he has been held without bail since December.

"He had enough and wanted to come back and have the opportunity to make it right," Mr. Obedin told reporters after the court proceeding on Long Island.

Sand faces up to four years in prison when he is sentenced in May.

"Neither court orders nor the familial bond meant anything to him as he fled to avoid his obligations," US Attorney Loretta Lynch said in a statement.

The two mothers of Sand's three children were not in the courtroom for Thursday's proceeding, but Obedin has said he has contacted them and claimed their priority is for Sand to be free to earn a living so he can repay his debt. As part of the plea agreement, Sand is required to make full restitution. He waived his right to appeal the guilty plea.

Obedin said Sand has worked in the past as a car salesman and has an offer to work in that field when he is released.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to 'No. 1 deadbeat parent' in jail after 11 years on the run
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Latest-News-Wires/2013/0221/No.-1-deadbeat-parent-in-jail-after-11-years-on-the-run
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe