Week In Review – South Bend

South Bend, Indiana — The United States Attorney’s Office announced the following activity in Federal Court:

PLEAS before Magistrate Judge Christopher A. Nuechterlein:

Shan Skinner, 44, of Portage, Indiana pled guilty to the felony offense of being a felon in possession of a firearm . The magistrate is recommending that the district court accept the tendered guilty plea.Parties have 14 days in which to object to the magistrate judge’s recommendation. This charge was filed as a result of an investigation by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.Sentencing has been set for 7/17/2014.This case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Frank Schaffer.

Willie Long, 23, of Elkhart, Indiana pled guilty to the felony offense of being a felon in possession of a firearm . The magistrate is recommending that the district court accept the tendered guilty plea.Parties have 14 days in which to object to the magistrate judge’s recommendation. This charge was filed as a result of an investigation by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.Sentencing has been set for 7/15/2014.This case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Frank Schaffer.

If convicted in court, any specific sentence to be imposed will be determined by the judge after a consideration of federal sentencing statutes and the Federal Sentencing Guidelines.

DISPOSITIONS before District Judge Jon E. DeGuilio:

Angela White, 28, of South Bend, Indiana was sentenced to 2 years supervised probation and to pay $36,705 in restitution after pleading guilty to the felony offense of conspiracy to defraud the United States Department of the Treasury.According to documents filed in this case, White participated with others in a false tax return preparation and filing scheme in South Bend, Indiana. Individuals prepared and submitted Forms 1040, U.S. Individual Income Tax Returns, with false or inflated Forms W-2 to obtain false tax refunds. Within the scheme approximately 1,189 tax returns were submitted for tax years 2008, 2009, and 2010 requesting a total of approximately $3,543,794.00 in tax refunds. White opened and controlled bank accounts that received tax refunds from these false tax returns. This case was the result of an investigation by the Internal Revenue Service.This case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Frank Schaffer.

Brian Lindsey, 27, of La Porte, Indiana was sentenced to 1 year supervised probation, 94 hours community service, and to pay $680, $100 in restitution after pleading guilty to the felony offense of passing counterfeit Federal Reserve notes.According to documents filed in this case, in December 2012, Lindsey purchased two Nook Notebook tablet computers using counterfeit Federal Reserve Notes in the denomination of twenty dollars in the total amount of $240 at a local department store.Lindsey was aware the bills were falsely made, forged and counterfeited at the time that he gave them to the cashier.This case was the result of an investigation by the United States Secret Service.This case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney John Maciejczyk.