PHOENIX, Arizona (LifeSiteNews) — An insurance executive and investigator with a law firm grabbed headlines last week for making allegations of racketeering, Mexican cartel-linked money laundering, and bribery of public officials during a state Senate election hearing on February 23.
Republicans have subsequently argued the claims are not sufficiently backed up by evidence and were inappropriate to bring before the Senate.
Jacqueline Breger, owner of the Fine-Breger Insurance Agency in Scottsdale, Arizona and lead investigator with the California-based Harris/Thaler Law Corporation, made the allegations during a 40-minute unsworn testimony before the Arizona Senate Committee on Elections and House Committee on Municipal Oversight and Elections.
EXPLOSIVE testimony today at the Sen. Elections and House O/sight hearings by Jackie Berger
Outlining the most complex investigation into Political corruption in AZ. @katiehobbs and her husband are laundering cartel money through fake deeds and mortgages.@KariLake pic.twitter.com/NhrBTchIMu
— Shadygrooove (@shadygrooove) February 24, 2023
Breger told legislators that, in her role as principal investigator for the law firm, she has overseen a wide-scale “investigation concerning multi-state racketeering and corruption,” which she argued has had a bearing on the integrity of Arizona’s elections.
According to Breger, the investigation has uncovered an expansive network in which Mexico’s Sinaloa drug cartel launders money through fraudulent real estate acquisitions, fake bankruptcies, and more, and then uses the cash to bribe elected officials.
“Over 120,000 pages of documents have been reviewed to date. And with that review has come evidence of multiple racketeering enterprises,” she told the Arizona Senate.
“They include: narcotics sales, money laundering, tax evasion, payroll theft, bankruptcy fraud, life insurance fraud, auto insurance fraud, bribing of elected and appointed public officials, creating or modifying public records, falsifying professional licenses and related credentials, swatting individuals who pose a threat to these enterprises, and last but not least: election fraud,” Breger said.
Among the officials alleged to have benefited from the scheme include Arizona Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs, Secretary of State Adrian Fontes, and U.S. Sen. Krysten Sinema.
The insurance executive and investigator also went on to accuse the City of Mesa and the Mesa Police Department of active involvement in the “racketeering enterprise.”
According to Breger, the “preliminary findings” in the investigation “were first reported to Governor Doug Ducey in May 2022.”
It remains unclear if the documents ever made it to Ducey.
She also said that attorney John Harris Thaler, who originated the report, “met with attorneys general in five states, with FBI agents, with the Internal Revenue Service, with the U.S. Bankruptcy Trustee and with several U.S. Attorney’s Offices.”
While Republican Committee Chairwoman Wendy Rogers commended Breger’s “brave[ry] following her February 23 testimony, Rogers later said the specific allegations Breger presented against elected officials should have been forwarded to law enforcement, not aired before the legislature.
“Any claims as serious as those presented to us should have been immediately turned in to Arizona law enforcement officials and not brought before the Legislature. This was not the appropriate venue to discuss what could potentially be criminal activity,” Rogers said the following weekend.
“To our knowledge, none of the people named had charges filed, have prosecutions pending, nor had any convictions made against them,” she added.
Breger had been invited to speak during the hearing by Republican Sen. Liz Harris, who has strongly pursued claims of election fraud but subsequently stated that Breger’s presentation lacked evidence “to substantiate these extraordinary claims.”
“Our committee’s job is to listen to a number of experts and members of the public and the mere fact that we listen to a presentation does not mean that we endorse or agree with it,” Harris said.
While Breger has produced a 100-page report outlining the law firm’s far-ranging allegations, crucial aspects of the report have opened it up to serious criticism.
Thaler, who heads up the law firm responsible for the report and who compiled the information presented by Breger, is currently in a romantic relationship with Breger and has a suspended license in the state of Arizona.
Moreover, key claims in the document center around the alleged criminal activity of two women identified as “Dawna Rae Chavez and her daughter Brittany Rae Chavez,” who the report alleges are employed directly by the Sinaloa drug cartel.
Dawna Rae and Brittany Rae are Thaler’s former mother-in-law and ex-wife, respectively. Thaler has been engaged in a string of court battles with his ex-wife over child custody disagreements.
In an upcoming book entitled “Report to the Governor,” Thaler claims that he married his ex-wife without knowing she was employed by the cartel and was involved in the “largest money laundering scheme in U.S. history,” The Post Millennial pointed out.
Thaler also argues that his ex-wife initially cooperated with his investigation into the alleged cartel money-laundering scheme, but that she later backed out due to threats and ultimately kidnapped their son in a bid to stop the investigation.
The Arizona Daily Independent noted that Thaler’s 2021 federal lawsuit naming his ex-wife and former mother-in-law, among others, was dismissed “with prejudice” by a U.S. District Judge who accused Thaler of filing a “frivolous” suit that “weaves a delusional and fantastical narrative that does not comport with federal pleading standards.”
Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs, who won against Republican candidate Kari Lake in a hotly contested election in November, responded to the cartel-related allegations made against her and other elected officials with an attempted witticism on Tuesday.
“No, I’m not involved with the Sinaloa Cartel, I’m not taking bribes from them, and I’m not laundering their money, so – just kidding,” she told reporters. “No, no, no, no, that was a joke.”