Judge Bridget Meehan Brennan of the United States District Court sentenced a Pennsylvania man to 24 months in prison after pleading guilty to conspiracy to conduct bank fraud.
Marquise A. Billy, 31, of Long Pond, was also sentenced to five years of supervised release following imprisonment. He was also forced to pay a $107,800 reparation fine.
According to court filings, Billy worked with a co-conspirator, Rodney A. Martin, 62, of the Bronx, New York, on a criminal conspiracy to locate banks where they could cash bogus checks. On October 12, 2022, the two flew from New York to Ohio. After landing in Columbus, Billy leased a car, and the two drove around the state cashing fake checks at banks they had pre-selected. Billy provided Martin with 14 counterfeit United States passport identification cards to use as identification while cashing checks. Martin switched between the IDs and used a different one for each bank transaction. Using this method, Martin was able to fraudulently cash checks worth $4,500 to $5,500 at multiple banking institutions.
During the investigation, investigators revealed that the defendants had traveled to Ohio and other locations many times to carry out their bank fraud scheme. The two guys went to 21 bank locations, where Martin cashed bogus checks with the phony IDs Billy gave. The banks targeted in Ohio’s Northern District included those in Ashtabula, Cuyahoga, Geauga, Portage, Trumbull, and Wayne counties. Billy and Martin stole a total of $107,800 from seven neighborhood banks.
On February 6, 2024, U.S. District Court Judge John R. Adams sentenced Martin to 30 months in prison and five years of supervised release after he pled guilty to conspiracy to conduct bank fraud and aggravated identity theft.
The United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations, the Social Security Administration-Office of the Inspector General, the Geauga County Sheriff’s Office, and the New York City Police Department all looked into this case.
Jason W. White, Special Assistant US Attorney for the Northern District of Ohio, prosecuted the case.
