Spring Nuptials For The Man Who Broke TheBanks and CUs In Rhode Island

PROVIDENCE, R.I. - (04/04/06) -- Can a convicted embezzler who causedthe greatest banking crisis since the Great Depression findhappiness after prison? Joseph Mollicone, whose theft of $15million from a local S&L caused the 1990 failure of creditunion-insurer Rhode Island Share and Deposit Indemnity Corp., hopesso. Now 62, Mollicone, out of prison a second time on parole, isengaged to marry 33-year-old Katy Hynes, who was legal assistant toMollicone's lawyers during his 1993 trial and is now a white-collardefense lawyer. Mollicone is paying $50 a month on the $12 millionin restitution he still owes for his RISDIC crimes, but his newwife will not be responsible for any of that debt. Mollicone wasthe president of Heritage Loan and Investment Co. and vicepresident of RISDIC. His disappearance after the discovery of histheft caused a domino-like failure of 45 institutions insured byRISDIC, including 29 credit unions, and caused the governor to callthe first bank holiday freezing depositor assets in all of thestate's financial institution on New Year's Day 1991. After hisembezzlement was discovered Mollicone fled to Salt Lake City andassumed a new identity, but turned himself in two years later.Mollicone has received special permission from the court to leavethe state for his honeymoon.