Sudbury housing officials are trying to evict William Camuti, who has been charged in connection with the death of Stephen Rakes, from his Sudbury affordable-housing unit, and he has been investigated in the past by Sudbury police, the MetroWest Daily News reports.
Rakes’ body was found in a wooded area off Mill Street in Lincoln last month. Law enforcement officials say Camuti poisoned him by putting cyanide in his iced coffee after luring him to a McDonald’s in Waltham to discuss a fictitious business deal. Camuti then allegedly drove around Waltham, Woburn, Burlington and Lincoln for several hours with Rakes in his car before dumping the body in Lincoln. Camuti has pleaded not guilty to charges of attempted murder, misleading police, and unlawful disposition of human remains.
The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner has not yet specified a cause or approximate time of death for Rakes but is expected to do so soon, when toxicology test results from the autopsy are in.
Camuti, 69, is a resident of the Musketahquid Village complex on Hudson Road near Sudbury Center. Tenants must be over 60 or disabled and have an income of no more than $45,500 if they are single, according to Jo-Ann Howe, executive director of the Sudbury Housing Authority.
Howe told the Lincoln Squirrel that because of privacy regulations, she could not confirm that Camuti was a Musketahquid tenant, but the MetroWest Daily News reported that he has been accused of violations including running a business out of his apartment and that Sudbury police have investigated Camuti on fraud allegations.
Camuti has a criminal record that Sudbury housing officials were apparently unaware of when he got his Musketahquid unit. When prospective tenants apply for an apartment, Howe said they must pass a criminal background check for Massachusetts court appearances, which turned up nothing for Camuti. However, he was convicted in 1993 in federal court on 11 counts of mail fraud in connection with a scheme to defraud investors.
Court documents reveal that Camuti ran a mortgage brokerage business called The Loan Depot from a building in Randolph and solicited investments from several Waltham businessmen, known at trial as “the Waltham Five,” saying their funds would be invested in high-quality residential mortgages. He was sentenced in 1994 to 116 months’ imprisonment and ordered to pay $2,528,000 in restitution. His conviction was upheld on appeal in 1996.
Camuti is being held without bail on the Rakes charges pending a dangerousness hearing on September 10, according to the Middlesex County District Attorney’s office.
Wiliam Camuti is currently in the hospital unit at Billerica House of Corrections. He sustained a broken hip after a fall, while at Cambridge Jail and he has had a hip replacement, consisting of 3 surgeries. He is now facing yet another operation on his hip and presently has limited mobility.