Month: June 2022

Source: United States Department of Justice News

HARRISBURG—The United States Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania announced that Jared B. Heisey, age 32, of Etters, Pennsylvania, was sentenced to two months’ imprisonment to be followed by five months of home confinement by United States District Court Judge Christopher C. Conner for assaulting a employee at the Naval Support Activity (NSA) in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania. Judge Conner also ordered Heisey to undergo counselling and have no contact with the victim.  

According to United States Attorney John C. Gurganus, Heisey, a former Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) supervisor, assaulted an employee during work hours on August 9, 2019, at the NSA. Heisey directed the victim to accompany him to conduct an inventory count in a remote building at the NSA and when they entered the building, Heisey pinned the victim up against the wall by grabbing her neck with his hand while making sexual comments about what he would like to do to her. Heisey is no longer employed by DLA.

The case was investigated by the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS). Assistant U.S. Attorney Jaime M. Keating prosecuted the case. 

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Source: United States Department of Justice News

COLUMBUS, Ga. – The ring-leader of a massive and lengthy scheme to drain the Muscogee County Clerk of Courts’ coffers of millions of dollars was sentenced to prison for his crime today, along with five co-defendants.

Willie Demps, 64, of Phenix City, Alabama, and the former Deputy Clerk of Court for Muscogee County, Georgia, was sentenced to serve the guideline maximum of 121 months imprisonment for conspiracy to commit bank fraud. On each of the two counts of tax evasion, he was given 60 months imprisonment with 12 months to be served consecutively to the bank fraud sentence. The total amount of imprisonment is 145 months to be followed by five years of supervised release. U.S. District Judge Clay Land handed down the sentence and ordered Demps to pay $1,323,045.21 in restitution to the Muscogee County Clerk of Court’s Office and $359,604 to the IRS, joint and severable with the other defendants, and advised that Demps’s retirement benefits be garnished to pay the restitution. In addition, the Government has requested a money judgement for $1,095,991, which will be ruled upon at a later date. There is no parole in the federal system.

“Willie Demps was the mastermind of an extraordinary, years-long theft of the Muscogee County taxpayers, stealing millions of dollars from its citizens under the guise of a trusted county employee,” said U.S. Attorney Peter D. Leary. “Demps has been brought to justice for his crimes thanks to the unwavering persistence of FBI and IRS investigators, who teamed up with federal prosecutors to map out the complex fraud and bring those involved in this scheme accountable.”

“The FBI was proud to work alongside our federal and local partners in this multimillion-dollar bank fraud investigation that uncovered a decade of illegal conduct by Demps and his codefendants,” said Keri Farley, Special Agent in Charge of FBI Atlanta.  “This lengthy sentence will hold Demps accountable for cheating U.S. taxpayers and hopefully bring closure to all who were affected by his crimes.”

“Demps abused his position as Deputy Clerk of Courts while engaging in a series of fraudulent financial transactions devised to siphon funds from the community.  IRS Criminal Investigation is proud to have assisted our federal partners in unraveling the criminal activity undertaken by Demps for his personal benefit,” said James E. Dorsey, Special Agent in Charge, IRS Criminal Investigation Atlanta Field Office. “Pooling the skills of each agency makes a formidable team as we investigate allegations of wrong-doing. Today’s sentencing demonstrates our collective efforts to enforce the law and ensure public trust.”

The following co-defendants were sentenced for conspiracy to commit bank fraud:

Terry McBride, 45, of Smiths Station, Alabama, was sentenced to serve 24 months in prison to be followed by five years of supervised release and pay $299,285 in restitution.

Samuel Cole, 73, of Columbus, was sentenced to serve 18 months in prison to be followed by five years of supervised release and pay $387,020 in restitution.

George Cook, 33, of Columbus, was sentenced to time served, five years of supervised release and pay $215,196 in restitution.

The following co-defendant was sentenced for misprision of a felony:

Lamarcus Palmer, 35, of Smiths Station, Alabama, was sentenced to serve one year probation and pay $12,606 in restitution.

The following co-defendant was sentenced for interstate transportation of stolen property:

Rosalie Bassi, 66, of Phenix City, Alabama, was sentenced to serve five years of probation and pay $61,896.46 in restitution.

The following co-defendants will be sentenced on June 14 after pleading guilty to conspiracy to commit bank fraud:

Curtis Porch, 48, and Dereen Porch, 43, both of Columbus.

According to court documents, Demps worked for the Muscogee County Clerk for approximately 30 years and supervised money deposits received by the Clerk’s Office. The Clerk’s Office received money from fines and condemnations, and payments were frequently made in cash. From at least 2010 to 2019, Demps maintained a safe in his office to store sums of cash that were collected by the Clerk’s Office. During the business day, this safe was rarely locked, even when Demps was away from his office. Demps (or his designee) was responsible for depositing cash received by the Clerk’s Office into an appropriate Clerk of Superior Court bank account. Records indicate that the Clerk’s Office received over $5.5 million in cash during the period of 2010-2019, yet only a single cash deposit of approximately $210 was made into official Columbus accounts in 2019. No cash deposits were made in other years.

From Oct. 19, 2010, to approximately Nov. 27, 2019, Demps issued at least 330 Clerk of Superior Court checks payable to the named co-defendants, and to some individuals not named, with a face value of at least $1.3 million. Bank records prior to Oct. 19, 2010, are not available, and the Muscogee County Clerk’s Office records prior to that date cannot be obtained. Demps would meet various co-defendants in locations away from his place of business at the Clerk’s Office to give the illicit checks to them to be cashed at banks in Columbus and in nearby Alabama. The co-defendants cashed the checks and returned the money to Demps, who would give the participating co-defendant a portion of the money. Demps admits he used the money for personal expenses, to send money to foreign countries and to spend at casinos.

Demps received cash deposits to his bank during the tax years 2018-2019, which he now admits were not the result of direct deposits from his lawful salary but rather proceeds from the money he stole from the Muscogee County Clerk’s Office. This money was not reported to the IRS and resulted in tax liability. Demps deposited $147,455 in cash in 2018 and $327,787 in cash in 2019 and fraudulently failed to account for these amounts as income on his tax returns. The IRS calculated Demps’s total amount of tax due from years 2015 to 2019 as $359,604.

FBI and IRS investigated the case, with assistance from the Columbus Police Department.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Amy Helmick prosecuted the case for the Government. Retired Assistant U.S. Attorney Mel Hyde initiated the prosecution of this case.

Source: United States Department of Justice News

HAMMOND- Jaron Johnson, 23, of Gary, Indiana, was sentenced by United States District Court Judge Philip P. Simon on his plea of guilty to kidnapping, announced United States Attorney Clifford D. Johnson.

Johnson was sentenced to 210 months in prison followed by 2 years of supervised release.

According to documents in the case, on the night of April 14, 2019, Johnson participated in the kidnapping of a woman hoping to elicit information as to the whereabouts of a witness in his brother’s upcoming criminal case.  Johnson participated in forcing the victim into a car at gunpoint, blindfolding and duct-taping her, and driving her around.  The victim was beaten and threatened when she would not provide the information.  At one point, the vehicle stopped, and another individual entered the back seat and continued beating the victim.  A short time later the victim was dragged from the car to an area behind a house where one of the perpetrators shot her in the face and arm, and left her for dead, but she survived the attack.             

This case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Gang Response Investigative Team with the assistance of the Gary Police Department, Indiana State Police, and Lake County Prosecutor’s Office.  This case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Michael Toth and former Assistant United States Attorney Thomas Mahoney.

This case was prosecuted as part of the joint federal, state, and local Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN) Program, the centerpiece of the Department of Justice’s violent crime reduction efforts.  PSN is an evidence-based program proven to be effective at reducing violent crime.  Through PSN, a broad spectrum of stakeholders work together to identify the most pressing violent crime problems in the community and develop comprehensive solutions to address them.  As part of this strategy, PSN focuses enforcement efforts on the most violent offenders and partners with locally based prevention and reentry programs for lasting reductions in crime.

Source: United States Department of Justice News

          LOS ANGELES – A British national was sentenced today to 36 months in federal prison for defrauding over 100 investors out of more than $8 million through a scheme that sold “ancient slag,” a mining waste byproduct that supposedly contained precious metals.

          Michael Godfree, 80, a United Kingdom citizen who resides in the Mount Washington neighborhood of Los Angeles, was sentenced by United States District Judge John A. Kronstadt, who also ordered Godfree to pay $8,336,965 in restitution.

          Godfree pleaded guilty in December 2021 to one count of mail fraud.

          From 2011 to November 2017, Godfree schemed to defraud victim-purchasers of material he identified as “ancient slag” and “gold ore.” He was co-founder of The Minerals Acquisition Company (TMAC), a Pasadena-based outfit that offered to sell slag to victims who were told the company would be able to extract precious metals from this slag, which was generated from copper mining. TMAC sold ton-quantities of the slag with promises of refining the material and recovering precious metals. TMAC provided victims with supposedly attorney-certified “Certificates of Title” that purported to transfer ownership of the slag to victims.

          Godfree fraudulently induced the victims to buy the “ancient slag” by falsely stating the “ancient slag” was valuable because it contained precious metals and a process would soon be available that could extract the precious metals supposedly in the slag.

          In fact, Godfree and TMAC did not actually own most of the slag they sold, there was not a commercially viable process for extracting precious metals from the slag, and the business operation had not been endorsed by a lawyer.

          Acting on Godfree’s false promises, victims sent the company money by mailing checks to the TMAC offices in Pasadena and by wiring money to accounts that Godfree controlled. Godfree used the funds to pay for his personal expenses.

          In total, Godfree and TMAC caused losses of approximately $8,336,965 to the victims of their fraud.

          TMAC was dissolved in 2015, but its operations were largely taken over by Precious Metals of North America Inc., another of Godfree’s companies.

          “Godfree was nothing more than a glorified conman,” prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memorandum. “At bottom, [Godfree] was selling nothing more than worthless dirt (that he generally didn’t own) along with a non-existent ‘process’ to extract value from the dirt…. Unsurprisingly, not a single victim-purchaser has ever seen any return on their purchase. Instead, the money was spent on lavish goods and personal expenses for [Godfree].”

          The FBI investigated this matter.

          Assistant United States Attorney Bruce K. Riordan of the Violent and Organized Crime Section prosecuted this case.

Source: United States Department of Justice News

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. – A Springfield, Mo., man pleaded guilty in federal court today to sexually assaulting a child victim and recording the abuse on his cell phone.

William Shane Berg, 49, pleaded guilty before U.S. Chief Magistrate Judge David P. Rush to one count of the sexual exploitation of a minor and one count of receiving child pornography over the internet.

By pleading guilty today, Berg admitted that he sexually abused a minor victim, identified in court documents as John Doe 2.

Law enforcement officers executed a search warrant at Berg’s residence on April 12, 2020, and seized a laptop computer, VHS tapes, CDs, two laptop hard drives, a portable hard drive, a CD writer, USB drives, a camera and media card, three Chromebooks, and a cell phone. Investigators found multiple files on the cell phone and the laptop computer that depicted Berg sexually abusing John Doe 2. They also found additional files of child pornography that Berg downloaded from the internet.

When the victim was interviewed at the Springfield Child Advocacy Center, he told investigators that Berg started sexually abusing him when he was in the fifth grade. He said Berg took videos on his cell phone during the sexual abuse.

Under federal statutes, Berg is subject to a mandatory minimum sentence of 15 years in federal prison without parole, up to a sentence of 50 years in federal prison without parole. The maximum statutory sentence is prescribed by Congress and is provided here for informational purposes, as the sentencing of the defendant will be determined by the court based on the advisory sentencing guidelines and other statutory factors. A sentencing hearing will be scheduled after the completion of a presentence investigation by the United States Probation Office.

This case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Ami Harshad Miller. It was investigated by the Southwest Missouri Cyber Crimes Task Force, the FBI and the Springfield, Mo., Police Department.

Project Safe Childhood

This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by the United States Attorneys’ Offices and the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state, and local resources to locate, apprehend, and prosecute individuals who sexually exploit children, and to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.usdoj.gov/psc . For more information about Internet safety education, please visit www.usdoj.gov/psc and click on the tab “resources.”