Tekoa man, 74, accused of stealing mother’s widow benefits

A 74-year-old Tekoa man suspected of stealing his dead mother’s military widow benefits for years is in Spokane County Jail facing a federal criminal charge. Robert E. Lee Jr. was booked just before 10 p.m. Thursday. He faces a potential charge of theft of government property over $1,000 and is scheduled to appear before a federal judge this afternoon. A months-long investigation began when a member of the Social Security Administration’s Office of the Inspector General conducted a routine check on a 100-year-old recipient of veteran’s benefits. The investigator tried to contact Minna A. Miller in July 2013 at her last known address in Orient, Washington, by phone and email with no success. According to the agency’s records, Miller received more than $160,000 in monthly benefits from the Department of Veteran’s Affairs between 1977 and 2014. Her husband, Curtis Miller, died in 1977 and was buried in Little Rock, Arkansas, according to court records. Minna Miller asked to be buried beside him, but investigators learned in October that her body wasn’t there. They traced checks drawn from the account where the VA funds were deposited to Lee, whose listed address was in Tekoa. None of the purchases on the account, made in and around Spokane, were for medical equipment or any other items to care for an elderly woman, according to investigators. Federal authorities also started monitoring Lee’s address in Tekoa and learned he shared the residence with sitting Tekoa City Councilwoman Eileen Soldwedel, according to court records. Last week, investigators obtained a search warrant for Lee’s home. They also questioned him, according to court records, and Lee told them his mother was in Arizona and he hadn’t seen her for a year. He also claimed to know nothing of her finances, according to court records. When they confronted him with the information they’d learned from their investigation, Lee asked to have a lawyer. During their search, authorities found a letter postmarked in 1987 from Arkansas, allegedly penned by Minna Miller. In that letter, she asks Lee to come quick because she’s “on the last round.” On Tuesday, Soldwedel’s attorney came to federal investigators with two letters sent to Miller and postmarked the day after the search in Tekoa. The letters allegedly were penned by Lee, apologizing for the investigation and saying he intended to leave the country “with one of my outlaw buddies.” The letters, allegedly written by Lee, said that his mother had died during a trip to California and that he’d buried her there. The writer says that he began forging her checks and accepting the monthly benefits as compensation for abuse he’d received as a child. The author also said he was dying of cancer and concluded by saying his real name was Hans Peter Ring. A spokesman with the U.S. Attorney’s Office of Eastern Washington said Friday he didn’t know where Lee was arrested or by whom. One of Lee’s neighbors reached by phone Thursday said she’d been informed not to speak about the case by federal investigators. Lee is in jail on a federal marshal’s hold and is scheduled to appear before a judge on the charge Friday afternoon. The charge carries a maximum prison sentence of 10 years.