Overview
- Manera pleaded guilty Monday to one felony count of being an accessory after the fact for helping Bernhard Fritsch evade capture after his April 2025 wire fraud conviction.
- She admitted making roughly $7,475 in payments, authorizing a hotel charge for his stay in Mexico, and giving false statements to FBI agents about her contact with him.
- Prosecutors say she also researched how Fritsch could leave Mexico for Germany, which would complicate U.S. extradition because Germany generally does not extradite its citizens.
- Fritsch fled the U.S. by car on June 2, 2025, remains a fugitive, was sentenced in absentia in October 2025 to 15 years in prison and ordered to pay about $26.8 million in restitution, and had his April 2026 appeal dismissed under the fugitive disentitlement rule unless he surrenders by Aug. 21, 2026.
- Manera faces up to five years in federal prison at her Oct. 5, 2026 sentencing and the case keeps attention on restitution for investors who lost an estimated $20 million to $25 million and on ongoing asset-forfeiture and extradition efforts.