Local radio personality Edward Alfred Bibbins (also known as Ed Owings) has been ordered to serve three and a half years in federal prison after Judge Curtis Collier said he continues to "abuse the court system."
The sentence was ordered, though attorney Leslie Cory said Bibbins is 69, wheelchair bound and dependent on a multitude of medications that he likely will not get in prison.
Judge Collier noted that Bibbins was in ill health during court appearances many years ago.
Bibbins, a one-time candidate for mayor of Chattanooga, was given until March 12 to self report to a federal prison.
Prosecutors said Bibbins has filed bankruptcy 10 different times and said he lied in his latest filing. He was convicted of perjury.
Judge Collier said Bibbins had shown "a persistent disdain for the federal court system" and had "used the courts for malicious purposes."
He said he had been ordered earlier by Judge Al Edgar to stop filing
"frivolous" lawsuits.
Judge Collier said, "He has demonstrated he will do this again and again even though he has been warned over and over."
Bibbins apologized, saying he had asked forgiveness "from my brethren in the ministry and my radio and television audience" for "telling a lie."
He asked mercy, saying, "In reality, I'm dying. I would like to spend the time I have remaining with my wife and grandchildren."
He said he had told the lie in the bankruptcy document "because all I could see was my wife being set out of doors" by creditors.
Judge Collier said Bibbins earlier in his life picked up numerous criminal charges and spent about three years of a 10-year term in state prison. He said in 1989 when he was 51 Bibbins turned from those crimes to filing numerous unfounded court actions.