A Chattanooga man was sentenced to five years of probation, 200 hours of community service, and home detainment for fraud by federal Judge Curtis Collier.
James Sowersby, a former Chattanooga businessman and operator of Puma Polymers, was found guilty of using counterfeit invoices to Cornerstone Bank in order to obtain advances on a line of credit. This occurred between 2011 and 2012. He did this several times, and eventually defrauded one person out of thousands of dollars, authorities said.
Sowersby’s attorney Chris Varner argued against the recommended 6-12-month prison sentence for several reasons.
The first was because of the matter of restitution. Sowersby owed close to $55,000 at one point, but had actually been making regular restitution payments for a couple years after a civil case had been resolved. He now owes $18,000, and his attorney asked the court to take this into consideration.
He argued that if his client was imprisoned, then Sowersby would be unable to continue to make payments, thus violating his civil agreement. As the attorney told Judge Collier, “Mr. Sowersby has taken extensive effort to restore losses.” He also said Sowersby invested his own money when his company went south in an effort to pay his creditors.
If Sowersby was unable to continue making his payments, the sentence “would do the victim a disservice, and would breach the agreement made in civil litigation,” it was stated.
The defense also argued for leniency within his six-month home detainment, arguing that his work would require him to leave his house, and often the country, on a fairly frequent basis. And because this work was necessary to continue making restitution, Sowersby needed this leniency.
Lastly, Sowersby, while he worked from home, was the parent in the household tasked with running children to school, meeting with teachers, and doing other such tasks while his wife worked full time. On top of this, Sowersby has a daughter in intensive outpatient care in North Carolina he wished to be able to visit on a consistent basis.
While prosecution agreed with the general terms of his sentencing, the prosecuting attorney did point out that the defendant was making quite a few demands as a man about to be sentenced.
“Sowersby needs to realize he is not in control,” said the prosecutor, “I worry about some of the rhetoric I’m hearing”
After listening to these arguments and demands, Judge Collier allowed the probation but required the 200 hours of community service at a place like the Community Kitchen or the Urban League, and six months of home detention. The restitution payments would continue until his debt has been paid.
Puma had acquired a line of credit from Cornerstone Community Bank. It was $300,000, then increased to $800,000 and then to $1,100,000.
In order to obtain advances, Puma would create a customer invoice to the bank and then ship the product to the customer. Payment from the customer was to be sent to a lock box maintained by Cornerstone.
The case was prosecuted by Perry Piper and Steve Neff.