Ben Vargason, owner of Great American Sports, and Jennifer Azbill Hall, an employee for B&H Finance, a mortgage company in Jackson, have been charged with knowingly and intentionally devising a scheme to defraud and to obtain money by means of false and fraudulent pretenses monies and funds under the custody and control of a federally insured financial institution.
According to the indictment, which was handed down by in the United States District Court for the Western District of Tennessee – Eastern Division – Vargason and Hall were part of the scheme where Hall would open retired or closed mortgage accounts in the name of former and current B&H customers.
Hall would obtain loan funds using the names and identities of the customers without their knowledge and consent.
It was further part of the scheme to defraud that Hall would take B&H Finance checks, drawn on the Commercial Bank account, and would forge the signature of R.S. on the checks. Hall would make the checks payable to the names of the unwitting customers, or to B&H Investments.
It was further part of the scheme to defraud that Hall would take the B&H Finance checks to Benjamin Vargason (“Vargason”) at his business, Great American Sports, in Jackson.
Hall would endorse the checks with the purported signatures of the unwitting customers, or as B&H investments in Vargason’s presence.
It was further part of the scheme to defraud that Vargason would deposit the endorsed checks into his company’s bank account at BancorpSouth, a bank insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation.
Vargason would then give Hall a portion of the amount of the checks in cash, or write Hall a check from his company’s bank account for a portion of the amount of the deposited checks.
Over the course of the scheme and artifice to defraud, the defendants misappropriated approximately $819,916.63 from B&H Finance.
If convicted, Vargason faces 20 years for each year of nine counts of bank fraud, and Hall faces 20 years for each year of counts one through nine for bank fraud, and 20 years for each year of wire fraud for counts 10 through 20.
(PHOTO: Ben Vargason)
David Thomas, Twitter – @DavidThomasWNWS
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