Former state senator Andy Sanborn is pushing to have criminal charges against him dropped, arguing the New Hampshire Attorney General’s felony theft case against him is legally flawed and will not hold up in court.

Sanborn, who is charged with theft by deception and theft by unauthorized taking, is accused of inflating revenue figures for his business, Win Win Win, which owns Concord Casino, to obtain $188,474 more in state grant funds than he was eligible to receive. The funds were distributed through the New Hampshire Department of Revenue Administration (DRA).

In their argument, Sanborn’s attorneys contrast the case to felony charges against someone accused of stealing a car, burglars who break into homes or scammers who drain a relative’s bank account without their knowledge. 

“Mr. Sanborn did not infiltrate DRA’s headquarters under cover of darkness and take funds from a vault or hack DRA’s servers to siphon out Main Street Relief funds,” wrote his attorneys. “He filled out an application, DRA approved it, DRA authorized a grant, and then DRA sent him a signed check.”

Sanborn says he’s been unfairly targeted by New Hampshire’s Attorney General John Formella, arguing thousands of other applicants filed similar applications for COVID relief which could have contained inaccurate figures. 

“The fixation on finding  a crime to fit the person is visible in the degree to which the law has taken a backseat to the AG’s  pursuit,” wrote his attorneys “AG Formella could not have it appear as though he was being soft on another Republican.”

This isn’t the first time Sanborn has asked Merrimack County Superior Court to toss out the case. Previously, he argued to dismiss the case on the basis that the investigative team had accessed privileged information, like attorney-client communications, that they shouldn’t have.

The Attorney General’s case accuses Sanborn and his company Win Win Win of overstating its 2019 gross receipts by about $1 million in its application for the Main Street Relief Fund grant in order to obtain extra money.

Sanborn’s attorneys argue the decision to bring Win Win Win into the case has complicated Sanborn’s efforts to sell the Concord Casino, with potential buyers now hesitant for fear the case could carry over to the business if the sale is finalized.

For months, the Attorney General's Office and Sanborn’s legal team have been at odds, accusing each other of bad faith, which has dragged the sale of the casinos on for over a year. 

In addition, multiple civil court lawsuits exist between the two parties.

In their brief, Sanborn's lawyers argue that the indictment was issued against his business to block its sale.

“Leveraging the state’s criminal power to pursue a backdoor victory in a civil case is inappropriate and illegal,” wrote his attorneys.

Prior to the criminal charges Sanborn, the state executed a search warrant in May at the Concord Casino, located on South Main Street in Concord, which led to the seizure of five computers and 30 boxes of documents.  

Among these documents were correspondence between Sanborn and his lawyers discussing legal strategies that were improperly accessed by the investigation team.

In January, Judge John Kissinger disqualified two members of the state investigative team from participating in the criminal case because they accessed information they shouldn’t have.

The Attorney General’s Office admitted its mistake. 

“This was not intentional misconduct, but a single, unintentional mistake that was promptly addressed,” said Michael Garrity, director of communications at the Office of the Attorney General. “As soon as the NH DOJ became aware of the error, our prosecutors raised the issue in court and informed Mr. Sanborn’s lawyers and the Court, including the fact that one of our prosecutors and a forensic accountant inadvertently had contact with  privileged documents.”

Sruthi Gopalakrishnan can be reached at sgopalakrishnan@cmonitor.com