Ex-Shelter Island justice admits ID theft

A former Shelter Island Town justice and her husband have received probation after pleading guilty to charges involving sales of stock shares belonging to an elderly woman.

Former justice Katherine Z. Pope pleaded guilty to fourth-degree identity theft, a misdemeanor, and her husband, Wayne, pleaded guilty to fourth-degree grand larceny, a felony, before Judge Stephen Braslow in a Riverhead courtroom on Tuesday, according to Robert Clifford, spokesman for the Suffolk County district attorney's office.

The couple both waived their rights to appeal, Clifford said. Katherine Pope received three years of probation and Wayne Pope got five years of probation.

There was no restitution ordered, but the Popes face a Surrogate's Court battle which has been delayed until the criminal trial reached a resolution.

The Popes' attorney could not be reached for comment. Attempts to reach the Popes were unsuccessful.

The original indictments, covered under the plea bargain, allege that Wayne and Katherine Pope sold 12,000 shares of Exxon stock belonging to Mary Abbott Estabrook in 2005, and kept the money. Court documents in Surrogate's Court claim that Estabrook changed her decades-old will to give the Popes' her Water Mill home, and made Katherine Pope her attorney under duress.

Estabrook has since died. Her relatives, including a South Dakota second-cousin who was the original executor, accuse the Popes of taking advantage of Estabrook when she was incapacitated from senility and a car accident.