Two males who made false representations to a financial institution to acquire more cash for Newbo Evolve, a three-day music and cultural occasion held in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, in August 2018, have been every sentenced on February 16, 2023, to a couple of yr in federal jail.
Doug Hargrave, age 56, from Puyallup, Washington, and Aaron McCreight, age 48, from Dothan, Alabama, acquired the jail phrases after they every pled responsible on January 26, 2022, to at least one rely of financial institution fraud.
Data from the plea and sentencing hearings confirmed that the 2 males beforehand held government positions in Go Cedar Rapids (“GoCR”), the nonprofit group that deliberate and executed Newbo Evolve. McCreight was President and Chief Govt Officer, and, in the summertime of 2018, Hargrave was GoCR’s Finance Director. Newbo Evolve featured, along with different sights, concert events by singer Kelly Clarkson and the band Maroon 5. Because the Newbo Evolve occasion dates approached, GoCR didn’t have the funds for to, amongst different issues, pay Kelly Clarkson and purchase the alcohol that was to be bought on the live performance venue.
Hargrave and McCreight then defrauded the monetary establishment that prolonged a mortgage to GoCR to finance Newbo Evolve by making misrepresentations about Newbo Evolve’s precise ticket gross sales, projected income, projected bills, and the true quantity of loss they have been projecting and anticipating Newbo Evolve to generate. These misrepresentations fraudulently induced the financial institution to mortgage GoCR further cash for Newbo Evolve. In July 2018, McCreight and Hargrave despatched a false and fraudulent Newbo Evolve 2018 Finances to the financial institution in assist of GoCR’s request for a rise in its mortgage. In a gathering with representatives of the financial institution, McCreight fraudulently misrepresented the variety of tickets that had been bought for Maroon 5 and Kelly Clarkson’s performances. The financial institution subsequently elevated the mortgage to GoCR from $1.5 million to $2.2 million.
Newbo Evolve occurred on August 3-5, 2018. The occasion misplaced greater than $2 million. After receiving revenue that Newbo Evolve produced, the lending financial institution misplaced $1,442,231.25 on GoCR’s defaulted $2.2 million promissory observe. Closely in debt with no money or belongings, GoCR ceased operations in October 2018. Roughly 97 distributors that offered providers for Newbo Evolve didn’t obtain full cost, dropping roughly $800,000 within the combination. United States District Courtroom Choose C.J. Williams famous in sentencing Hargrave and McCreight, they dedicated the offense to avoid wasting face and, whereas they didn’t line their very own pockets, they gambled with the financial institution’s cash.
McCreight and Hargrave have been sentenced in Cedar Rapids by United States District Courtroom Choose C.J. Williams. McCreight was sentenced to 18 months’ imprisonment. Hargrave was sentenced to fifteen months’ imprisonment. Each males have been ordered to make $1,442,231.25 in restitution to the lending financial institution joint and several other with one another. Each males should additionally serve a three-year time period of supervised launch after the jail time period. There isn’t any parole within the federal system.
McCreight and Hargrave have been launched on bonds beforehand set and are to give up to the Bureau of Prisons on dates but to be set.
The case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The case was prosecuted by former United States Lawyer Sean R. Berry, Assistant United States Lawyer Matthew J. Cole, and Assistant United States Lawyer Kyndra Lundquist.
Courtroom file info at https://ecf.iand.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/login.pl.
The case file numbers are 22-CR-0001 and 22-CR-0002.
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