A federal judge issued an arrest warrant for the chief of staff of former Republican Maryland Governor and one-time potential presidential candidate Larry Hogan after the man failed to appear at his corruption trial, the Baltimore Banner reports.
Hogan’s chief of staff for eleven weeks in the summer of 2020, Roy McGrath is facing charges of wire fraud, theft and falsifying official documents for directing $30,000 from Maryland Environmental Service, an independent state agency he headed from 2006 to 2020 before taking the executive office position. On top of $233,000 in “severance”–approximately one year’s salary–approved by the agency’s board of directors, McGrath reportedly directed the agency to pay for a $15,000 executive training course at Harvard and he ordered an agency administrator to pay $15,000 to a private organization to fulfill a personal pledge he made. McGrath is also accused for forging an official memo from Hogan claiming the payments had his blessing.
McGrath fled to Florida after Hogan was term-limited out of office in 2021. His trial was scheduled to start Monday morning, but McGrath’s defense attorney said he sent numerous text messages to both McGrath and McGrath’s wife but had no response by the 9:00 a.m. ET court time.