Frank Parlato
Leo Grillo is a former client of the author. Frank Parlato has previously published investigative reporting on the civil case underlying this matter.
Leo Grillo Arrested in Kidnapping Sting — The Man Who Set Him Up Had His Own Reasons
Leo Grillo, 77, founder of DELTA Rescue — the no-kill animal sanctuary in Acton, which he built over 45 years — was arrested Tuesday on a federal charge of attempted kidnapping. The alleged target was Adriana Duarte Valentines, a former DELTA employee who won a $6.7 million wrongful termination verdict against him in November 2024.
Federal prosecutors say Grillo paid $30,000 toward a plan to have Duarte kidnapped, flown from Lancaster, CA, to Mexico, and held hostage until she cooperated with him on his appeal of the verdict.
On Wednesday, a judge denied bond. Grillo faces up to 20 years in federal prison if convicted.
He has denied it. He says he was paying for a documentary.
The Background
In November 2024, a Los Angeles jury awarded Duarte $5.68 million in compensatory damages and $1 million in punitive damages against DELTA Rescue. Judge Kristin Escalante later reduced the total to approximately $2.9 million. DELTA filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in May 2025. The verdict is under appeal.
Among the issues on appeal are that Judge Escalante barred the jury from learning that Duarte had entered the United States illegally, used a fabricated Social Security number to obtain employment, never filed a tax return, and — according to a forensic audit — stole more than $339,000 in pet food and supplies from DELTA, which she sold at weekend swap meets for cash.
What the mostly Mexican-American jury did see was Grillo’s deposition — clips of him calling Duarte “bimbo,” “lettuce picker,” “criminal,” “Mexican” — played approximately 50 times on a 47-inch screen. The clips were played without context, without the questions that preceded the answers, and shown out of sequence.
Grillo was furious when the verdict came in. He believed that the system had robbed him and his 1500 rescue animals.
The Man Who Went to the FBI
In December 2025, Grillo left a voicemail for a man identified in federal court documents as Cooperating Witness 1 (CW1).
Every outlet that covered this arrest portrayed CW1 as an Arizona businessman with contacts in Mexico. Nobody identified him.
The cooperating witness is James Clark, an Arizona precious metals dealer who is a one-third owner of Midas Gold Group LLC, headquartered in Phoenix, Arizona.
On June 7, 2024 — six months before he first met with Grillo — Clark signed Midas Gold Group’s Chapter 11 bankruptcy petition in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of Arizona.
The bankruptcy filing reveals that Midas Gold Group ran a precious metals IRA business generating $143 million in revenue in 2021, $83 million in 2022, and $91 million in 2023. Then it collapsed. By the time Clark filed for bankruptcy in June 2024, the creditor list showed dozens of IRA investors — retirees in Indiana, New Jersey, Georgia, Florida, Washington State, California — who had lost money. Claims totaled $3.35 million. These were people’s retirement savings that CW1 lost or stole.
The FBI affidavit discloses Clark’s legal jeopardy in a footnote: “CW1 is the target of a separate FBI investigation into alleged fraud. CW1 is working with law enforcement in hopes of receiving favorable consideration in connection with that investigation.”
According to sources familiar with the case, Grillo allegedly called Clark because Clark had business connections in Mexico — a money exchange, a limousine operation, a house there — and Grillo thought Clark knew powerful lawyers in Mexico who could approach Duarte.
The idea, as Grillo understood it, was to invite Duarte voluntarily to Mexico, where a lawyer would show her that her immigration exposure — illegal entry, a fraudulent Social Security number, years of unpaid taxes — made her vulnerable, and that settling with Grillo was in her interest.
Over subsequent months, Clark kept updating him — the location had changed, drug wars made certain areas unavailable, and logistics were shifting. Each time, Clark provided the new details. Each time, sources say Grillo’s plan was to bring Duarte willingly, have a lawyer persuade her, and reach a settlement.
At one point, the defense says, Clark proposed having people physically take Duarte. Grillo says he rejected it explicitly.
If true, that directly negates the specific intent the government must prove. Attempted kidnapping requires that Grillo intended to seize and hold Duarte against her will. A man who explicitly rejected coercive abduction when it was proposed to him does not have that intent.
This is not the first time Clark has turned on someone under legal pressure. In 2012, Clark gave a deposition against his own father, Jim Clark, owner of Republic Monetary Exchange, in a civil lawsuit. His father and his father’s business partner were both convicted of white-collar crimes.
The Recording Failures
The case against Grillo is largely based on Clark.
At a December 2025 meeting at the Los Angeles Equestrian Center in Burbank, Grillo allegedly first discussed gathering information about Duarte. There is no recording. The feds have only Clark’’s word.
The January 7, 2026, meeting, where Grillo allegedly proposed kidnapping Duarte and her child and offered $100,000, also had no recording. Clark’s word only.
At the February 13, 2026, meeting, which lasted approximately 2.5 hours, the recording equipment failed after 30 minutes.
The March 3 final meeting was audio-recorded. Video equipment failed entirely.
Four meetings. The two where Grillo allegedly made the most incriminating statements have zero recording. The meeting where he allegedly confirmed the plan in detail was captured for only 30 minutes of the two-and-a-half hours.
What the Recordings Show
On February 24, in a recorded call at the FBI Phoenix field office, Clark told Grillo: “They can get her (Duarte) and the husband to the airport willingly and at that point they are going whether they want to or not. That flight’s taking off for a remote part of Mexico and they will be put into housing there.”
Grillo’s response: “Alrighty, we are good.”
Before Grillo said those words, he asked repeatedly whether the phone was secure. He asked Clark, “why did we need that call?” He said — and this is in the affidavit — “the problem with that is that if anyone picked that up it puts me right in the middle of it.”
Grillo thought it was the police, not kidnappers.
That is not a man giving orders. It appears to be a nervous 77-year-old being walked toward a conclusion by someone who has just spelled out the entire plan explicitly, on a phone the FBI provided, at the FBI Phoenix field office, with agents listening in real time.
According to the affidavit, Clark did not ask Grillo to confirm the kidnapping. Clark described the kidnapping in full and waited for Grillo to respond.
The Sting
On March 3, Clark met Grillo at the equestrian center. He was wired for audio. The video failed just when it would be the most important aspect.
Allegedly, Clark told Grillo, “they’ve got ’em,” and showed him a fake photograph on his phone — allegedly a man and woman bound with zip ties, duct tape over the woman’s mouth.
According to the affidavit, Grillo identified the woman in the photo as Duarte.
Clark had just told Grillo they had the woman. He showed him the photo. Then he told him who was in it. Grillo allegedly identified her.
That is not independent recognition. That is a 77-year-old man in a camper van in a parking lot, looking at a photo on someone’s phone after being told who he was looking at.
Clark then allegedly said the kidnappers needed another $10,000. Grillo wrote a check. The memo line: “Doc Invest.”
FBI agents arrested Grillo. They recovered two firearms from Grillo’s person.
What Grillo Said After His Arrest
Grillo agreed to speak with agents after receiving Miranda warnings. He repeatedly insisted the payments were for a documentary, not a kidnapping.
He acknowledged that if the appeal succeeded and the case were retried, Duarte’s inability to testify would benefit DELTA Rescue.
That is true. It is also the obvious legal reality that any appellant would understand about their own case. It is not a confession.
When Grillo said Duarte being “out of the picture” would help DELTA, he meant she had chosen to stay in Mexico after being shown the benefits of settling — gone by her own decision, not held by force. The government’s reading and Grillo’s reading are both plausible interpretations of the same words. That is a question for a jury.
The Check
Whatever questions surround this case, one fact remains hard to explain away.
Grillo allegedly saw a photograph of a woman bound with zip ties. Duct tape over her mouth.
The video that would have shown him actually looking at the photo failed. He was told she was Duarte. He was told she was being held.
He wrote a $10,000 check.
That moment — whatever preceded it, whatever Clark manufactured or manipulated — is the moment Grillo has to answer for. He had a clear opportunity to stop.
He did not stop.
A man who believed he was funding a documentary could have asked a question. Could have said: that photograph has nothing to do with what I’m paying for. Could have walked away.
Instead, he asked who to make the check out to.
Grillo’s explanation: he believed the people in the photograph were being arrested and held by Mexican police conducting a lawful operation.
Duarte, as Grillo knew, was an illegal immigrant with a fabricated Social Security number who had never paid taxes. He believed Clark’s Mexican lawyer contacts had found legitimate charges against her. When Clark showed him the photo and said they were stuck in Lancaster, Grillo says he panicked — not because a kidnapping had gone wrong, but because he feared an international incident involving Mexican police on American soil.
“Get them out,” was his thinking. The check was to move a police operation, not finance a kidnapping.
Whether a jury believes that is another matter. But it is not implausible on its face, given everything Clark had been lying to him about for months.
The Entrapment Question
James Clark was facing a federal fraud investigation with dozens of IRA victims and a bankrupt company behind him. He knew Grillo. He knew Grillo’s rage. He flew from Arizona to meet Grillo in December. He escalated each meeting. He spelled out the kidnapping plan in explicit terms on a recorded call while sitting in an FBI field office. He showed Grillo a staged photograph.
A defense attorney will argue that what the government created here was not the discovery of a crime but the manufacture of one — constructed on the testimony of a compromised witness with everything to gain, using conveniently failed recording equipment at every critical moment.
Clark’s word is worth exactly what a federal fraud target’s cooperation is always worth: something, but not too much.
What This Means for DELTA
High on a ridge in Acton, 1,500 animals live in a sanctuary Leo Grillo built from nothing over 45 years. Dogs in straw homes. Cats in air-conditioned cottages. Horses on pasture. No kill means no kill.
DELTA is already in bankruptcy. Its founder is in federal custody. The appeal of the civil verdict continues without him.
The Charge
Grillo is charged with one count of attempted kidnapping under 18 U.S.C. § 1201(d). Maximum sentence: 20 years. No prior criminal history is noted in the government’s detention filing.
The detention notice flagged two grounds for holding him: serious flight risk and serious risk of obstruction or witness intimidation. Two firearms recovered at the arrest closed the door on routine bail.
FBI Special Agent Robert McElroy signed the affidavit. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Kevin J. Butler, Kevin B. Reidy, and Haoxiaohan H. Cai are prosecuting. The FBI and U.S. Postal Inspection Service are investigating.
A FINAL WORD:
When DELTA falls, and it may fall, 1,500 animals will need somewhere to go — and there is nowhere for them to go.
Frank Parlato is an investigative journalist, media strategist, publisher, and legal consultant.
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