New Charge for Woman In False Threats Case

The case of Asli Dincer and Melih Dincer, the Turkish pair accused of sending false terrorism threats by email last spring to the Jewish Center of the Hamptons in East Hampton, took another twist on Jan. 23, when Asli Dincer, 44, turned her back on a deal to plead guilty to a reduced charge as well as to another, unrelated charge of grand larceny.

 Meanwhile, her former husband, Melih Dincer, pleaded guilty to one charge of falsely reporting an incident, a misdemeanor, and was sentenced to one year in jail. The couple were charged with sending three threats, the first on May 28, the last on June 8. Mr. Dincer, who is 34, told police he had sent the emails from an Internet cafe. He is now in jail in Yaphank.

In the other charge against Ms. Dincer, grand larceny in the first degree, she is accused of attempting to steal more than $1 million from a Westhampton Beach man in 2013. The incident occurred on Nov. 13, 2013, according to New York State Unified Court online records, which also show Nov. 13, 2013, as the date the Dincers’ uncontested divorce was filed in State Supreme Court. Supreme Court Justice Marlene L. Budd granted the divorce on March 13, 2014.

The Westhampton Beach man was identified in an article in the Riverhead News-Review as Murray C. Frank, who died in May, at about the same time Ms. Dincer and her former husband began to send the threats to the center. Their emails warned of an attack by Islamic fundamentalists, and mentioned several men with Arabic names. The Dincers indicated there would be an attack during the month of Ramadan, which began on June 28.

Alerted to the threats, the East Hampton Village Police Department contacted the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Several other law enforcement agencies got involved, with the F.B.I. dropping out when it became apparent that the threats were unfounded.

While the investigation continued, however, the Dincers traveled back to their native land for several weeks. Customs agents at Kennedy Airport and village police detectives arrested them when they returned to the United States in July.

According to Robert Clifford, a spokesman for District Attorney Thomas Spota, both Dincers had agreed to waive their right to have the charges put before a grand jury. “She had agreed to plead guilty to grand larceny in the fourth degree, and falsely reporting an incident in the third degree,” he said yesterday. In return, she would have been sentenced to two one-year terms, to be served concurrently.

On Jan. 23, when she was brought into Acting Supreme Court Justice Fernando Camacho’s courtroom, Mr. Clifford said, “She changed her mind.”

Justice Camacho sent her to county jail in Riverside, without the possibility of bail, where she is being held until Feb. 10, when she is due back in his courtroom.