'Dead' Banker: My Family Had No Idea I Was Alive

Aubrey Lee Price had apparently been homeless, took odd jobs for cash
By Kate Seamons,  Newser Staff
Posted Jan 3, 2014 1:07 AM CST
'Dead' Banker: My Family Had No Idea I Was Alive
This June 2012 file photo released by the FBI, shows Aubrey Lee Price in Key West, Fla.   (AP Photo/FBI)

A routine traffic stop on Tuesday in Georgia ended Aubrey Lee Price's time on the run, and what happened during his days as a fugitive became a little more clear on Thursday. That's when Price, 47, appeared in federal court over allegations that he embezzled $21 million from a Georgia bank over 2011 and 2012 (more on the indictment here); a bond hearing was set for Monday, but in the meantime, the judge was told by a US marshal that Price said he was homeless and had sustained himself over 18 months by working odd jobs, reports the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

NBC News reports that the FBI wasn't convinced Price had actually committed suicide in 2012, as he allegedly tried to lead people to believe. Rather, it suspected he may have fled to South America. Price says his family, for its part, was unaware he was still alive; the Florida Times-Union notes that some of them were in the court room. Price told officials that he had come back to Georgia in order to renew his truck's tag; it's unclear where he had been since June 16, 2012, when he vanished after boarding a ferry in Key West, though the marshal told the judge he had been living in different parts of the US. NBC News notes that the Coast Guard on Thursday issued a press release stating that it wasted more than $173,000 searching for Price in the waters around the ferry's path. (More Aubrey Lee Price stories.)

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