MAYS LANDING – After nearly six years of gossip, rumor and speculation, shore endocrinologist James Kauffman was charged Tuesday in the death of his wife, radio personality April Kauffman, in a murder-for-hire plot prosecutors said was connected to the Pagan Outlaw motorcycle gang and designed to prevent her from exposing a vast illegal opioid pill distribution operation.
, an Atlantic City-area doctor, stands outside the house he shared with his wife, April Kauffman (right) who was shot to death. ){kind=link}
“As a result of April Kauffman’s desire to divorce James Kauffman, he was intent to have her killed, as opposed to losing his ‘financial empire’, as he described it to several individuals,” Atlantic County Prosecutor Damon G. Tyner said Tuesday.
The dramatic developments, announced at a 4 p.m. press conference, cemented Kauffman’s place in the annals of accused shore villains. He’s already being held in the Atlantic County jail on weapons charges after brandishing a gun last June when authorities executed an early morning search warrant at his popular Egg Harbor Township medical practice.
Tyner said Kauffman, 68, and a co-conspirator, Ferdinand Augello, 61, of Petersburg, N.J. conspired to solicit someone to commit the murder of April Kauffman for a year before finding a triggerman, identified by authorities as Francis “Frank” Mullholland. Prosecutors said Mullholland was paid at least $20,000 and given a gun the morning of May 10, 2012. Tyner said he died of an overdose in October, 2013.
“The doors were left open and Francis Mulholland was given a gun,” Tyner said.
Augello was also charged with trying to kill James Kauffman, Tyner said. Both Augello and Kauffman were charged with racketeering charges. Six others were also charged with racketeering Tuesday in connection with the scheme.
The lack of an arrest in the murder of the shore radio host and veteran’s advocate had deeply troubled Kauffman’s family, friends and colleagues in veterans’ issues, who advocated tirelessly for “Justice for April,” even as Dr. Kauffman’s busy practice continued, and he remarried.
Atlantic County Prosecutor Damon Tyner says eight people, including Dr. James Kauffman, arrested for 2012 Pagan gang-related murder for hire of Shore radio host April Kauffman. “this has gone on for too long,” Tyner said. pic.twitter.com/1Su5x7hMjv
— Amy S. Rosenberg (@amysrosenberg) January 9, 2018
Kimberly Pack, 35, April Kauffman’s daughter, appeared a short time after the press conference Tuesday and told reporters gathered in the lobby of her attorney’s office that the details she heard about the stepfather she has long suspected of playing a role in her mother’s murder were “gut wrenching.” She said her mother had shared fears about her husband, but Pack had been unaware of the dramatic larger context laid out by the prosecutor.
“As a victim, May 10, 2012 forever changed my life,” she said. “I have been waiting patiently for justice, and today I was lucky enough to be granted justice. I think for the first time, today I can actually breathe.”
Kimberly Pack, daughter of slain radio host April Kauffman said her mother had shared her concerns about Dr. James Kauffman. The details she heard today were “gut wrenching,” she said. pic.twitter.com/9DJ5bv4iYa
— Amy S. Rosenberg (@amysrosenberg) January 9, 2018
The arrests come five and a half years after the popular radio host and veteran’s advocate was found shot to death in the couple’s bedroom inside their Linwood home. Despite the unrelenting gossip about the case, the details laid out Tuesday placed the crime in a dramatic new context.
Tyner said Kauffman maintained a “long term alliance” with members of the Pagan Outlaw Motorcycle gang, an association created to use Kauffman’s practice for financial gain related to an illegal drug distribution ring.
Kauffman’s practice was shut down last summer after authorities executed a search warrant and raid and he brandished a 9 mm gun and shouted “I’m not going to jail for this.”
Tyner said Kauffman had maintained a long-term alliance with members of the Pagan Outlaw Motorcycle Gang created “for the mutual financial gain through the use of Kauffman’s medical practice for illegal drug distribution.”
April Kauffman had threatened to “spend as much money as she could until a divorce was granted,” according to a news release from the Prosecutor, and threatened “to expose the fraudulent and unlawful practices taking place at her husband’s medical office.”
Tyner said James Kauffman told Augello that his wife was threatening to “expose the illegal OXY distribution network they had established.” The drug scheme involved Kauffman writing prescriptions for various people recruited down a hierarchy tied to the scheme.
Amy Rosenberg
At the time, the raid on Kauffman’s office was said to be related to an ongoing health care fraud investigation that has snagged a dozen people on federal charges and involves area municipal workers, including firefighters, police officers and teachers. That scheme involved prescriptions for compound pharmaceuticals like vitamins and scar cream.
But Tyner also said at the time that the raid involved the ongoing investigation into Kauffman’s murder.
He declined to say Tuesday whether there was a connection between the Pagan drug scheme and the prescription public health benefits scheme that has ensnared defendants in federal court in Camden.
April Kauffman was found shot to death in the couple’s bedroom May 10 2012 after her husband had left for work. Her body was discovered by a handyman who cared for pet birds in the couple’s home in the suburb of Atlantic City. James Kauffman said she was alive when he left and has denied any role in the crime, despite speculation of his involvement.
Kauffman’s attorney, Ed Jacobs, said he had not officially been informed of the charges but said Kauffman has long maintained his innocence. “Suffice it to say that Dr. Kauffman has consistently denied any involvement whatsoever in the homicide of his wife,” Jacobs said by telephone.
Also charged Tuesday was Beverly Augello, the ex-wife of Kauffman co-conspirator Ferdinand Augello. She is alleged to have picked up the money on the day of the murder, along with additional prescriptions, “used to obtain drugs that day,” the prosecutor said. She was charged with first degree racketeering.
Tyner said that the drug enterprise continued for five years after the murder, involving members or former members or associates of the Pagan gang. “The enterprise folded in June of 2017 with the arrest of James Kauffman,” Tyner said.
He said FBI agents were determined not to let the case go unsolved. “This has gone on for too long,” Tyner said.
Also charged with 1st degree racketeering were: Joseph Mulholland, 52, of the Villas, and Glenn Seeler, 37, of Sanford, N.C. Charged with second degree racketeering were: Paul Pagano, 61, of Egg Harbor Township, Tabitha Chapman, 35, of Absecon, and Cheryl Pizz, 36, of Murrells Inlet, S.C.
TOM GRALISH / Staff Photographer
Pack, who fought first to get her stepfather to place a headstone at her mother’s grave, then filed a lawsuit charging him with wrongful death, and has maintained since the murder that her step-father was involved, said she watched the press conference broadcast with her two sons, aged 11 and 7, who she said have become “desensitized” to news of their grandmother’s murder.
“This has been our lives since May 10, 2012,” she said. “It’s not fair. They’re children. My 11 year old was very close to my mom. After watching the press conference, I got a huge squeeze from him and he said, you know what Mom? Mimi’s happy”
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