[Phrozen1ne]

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CRM
FRIDAY, AUGUST 7, 2007 (202) 514-2008
WWW.USDOJ.GOV TDD (202) 514-1888

Former Treasurer of International Fraternity Sentenced to Prison in Connection with Bank Fraud and Theft

Washington, D.C. -Terry Davis, 41, the former elected National Treasurer of Phi Beta Sigma, an international fraternal organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., has been sentenced to concurrent sentences of 51 months in prison for committing bank fraud and 24 months in prison for committing theft in the first degree and fraud in the first degree stemming from his theft of over $200,000 from the fraternity’s bank account, U.S. Attorney Jeffrey A. Taylor and Joseph Persichini, Jr., Assistant Director in Charge of the FBI’s Washington Field Office, announced today.

Davis, formerly of Memphis, Tennessee and Herndon, Virginia, was sentenced this morning in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia by the Honorable Reggie B. Walton. In addition to the concurrent sentences of 51 months and 24 months, Judge Walton ordered that the defendant (1) pay restitution of $221,000 to Phi Beta Sigma, and (2) be placed on 5 years of supervised release following his release from prison.

A federal jury sitting in the District of Columbia found Davis guilty of the charges on May 3, 2007, following an eight-day trial. According to the evidence presented at trial, between January 2001 and June 2003, while he was the elected, National Treasurer of Phi Beta Sigma, Davis had custody of the fraternity’s check book. During that time period, Davis wrote 126 checks payable to cash, without authorization, using the fraternity’s check book. On many of the checks, Davis forged the name of the fraternity’s National President. In many instances, Davis falsely wrote on the memo line of the check that the proceeds of the check were intended for legitimate fraternity purposes when, in fact, Davis diverted the proceeds to personal expenses. Davis also forged the bank signature cards for the fraternity’s checking account and falsely represented to the bank, among other things, that the number of required signatures on the fraternity’s checking account had been reduced from two signatures to one signature. Davis deposited the proceeds of many of the checks into his personal bank accounts and expended the proceeds on personal expenses. It was shown at trial that the proceeds obtained by Davis through the 126 checks made payable to cash totaled over $200,000.

In announcing the sentence, U.S. Attorney Taylor and FBI Assistant Director in Charge Persichini praised the efforts of FBI Special Agent Mark Stanley. They also commended the work of the following individuals from the U.S. Attorney’s Office: Supervisory Paralegal Specialist Janean Bently; Paralegal Specialists Melanie Howard, Lynita Greene and Jeanie Latimore-Brown; Legal Assistant Lisa Robinson; and Assistant U.S. Attorneys Michael Atkinson and John Roth, who prosecuted the case.