Former Reagor Dykes Auto Group proprietor Bart Reagor was sentenced Thursday to 14 years in federal jail for mendacity to a financial institution concerning the firm’s prospects.
In October, Reagor, 55, was discovered responsible of mendacity to the Worldwide Financial institution of Commerce after transferring greater than $1.7 million of a $10 million mortgage meant for the Lubbock, Texas, auto group to his private account from 2017 to 2018.
Reagor was additionally ordered to pay about $9.4 million in restitution, in line with a press launch from the U.S. Lawyer’s Workplace for the Northern District of Texas.
“Mr. Reagor’s sentence sends a transparent message to any prison who makes use of company fraud for their very own private achieve,” FBI Dallas Particular Agent in Cost Matthew DeSarno stated within the press launch.
Reagor Dykes imploded and filed for chapter in August 2018 after an audit discovered discrepancies in what was owed to Ford Motor Credit score, resulting in separate fees in opposition to 15 of Reagor’s former workers.
All 15 pleaded responsible to their roles in a $50 million wire fraud conspiracy in opposition to Ford Credit score, and in January, Reagor Dykes’ former CFO Shane Smith was sentenced to seven years in jail.
Smith admitted to orchestrating floorplan fraud and check-kiting schemes to lie about gross sales. He additionally testified at Reagor’s trial that Reagor ceaselessly drew cash out of the enterprise for private use, the U.S. Lawyer’s Workplace stated.
Reagor acquired the longest sentence of anybody from his firm.
All through the trial, the prosecution launched as proof video clips of him encouraging his workers to do no matter it took to grow to be millionaires.
“Come on as much as the millionaire zone, come on as much as the personal jet-owning, gator-wearing, Rolex-wearing membership,” he stated to his workers at an organization assembly. “Or you may cry your approach to sleep with all the opposite [expletive] losers.”
Reagor additionally instructed his workers that anybody who introduced house a five-digit wage was broke .
“To Bart Reagor, anybody who is not a millionaire is a chump. And Mr. Reagor could not face being a chump,” U.S. Lawyer Chad Meacham stated within the press launch. “As a substitute of doing his greatest to develop his enterprise truthfully, he padded his private checking account by mendacity to a federally-insured financial institution.”