Co-Defendant of Former Louisville Minister Sentenced for Defrauding the United States
Shiloh Baptist Community Renewal Center Administrator Ordered to Pay $831,742.56 in Restitution

LOUISVILLE, KY—The former grant administrator of Shiloh Baptist Community Renewal Center has been sentenced to 12 months and one day in prison and ordered to pay $831,742.56 in restitution for her part in a conspiracy to defraud the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) announced David J. Hale, United States Attorney for the Western District of Kentucky.

Co-conspirator Yvette Crayton Goodwin, acting as consultant and grant writer for SCRC, pleaded guilty in September 2009, to charges of conspiring to defraud HUD, including diverting grant monies for her personal benefit and gain, and for the benefit and gain of other individuals and entities not legally entitled to the receipt of those funds. She was sentenced Monday, September 26, 2011 by U.S. District Court Judge Jennifer Coffman.

On January 18, 2011 Reverend Henry M. Humphrey, a minister of Shiloh Baptist Church, was sentenced in Louisville in United States District Court for conspiring to defraud the United States, soliciting kickbacks of federal funds, committing wire fraud, submitting a false writing to the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), and conspiring to launder money. Reverend Humphrey was sentenced to two years in prison and three years’ supervised release by Judge Coffman who also ordered Reverend Humphrey to pay $831,742.56 in restitution, an amount to be restored to HUD, the agency victimized by Humphrey’s conduct.

Humphrey entered a guilty plea to 11 separate criminal charges in June 2010. In the plea agreement he admitted that, between February 25, 1998 through November 2005, he and other co-conspirators took federal grant money intended for the rehabilitation of the Maupin Building in Louisville’s Parkland neighborhood and conspired to cover up the diversion of funds. Approximately $1,825,000 in federal and other funds had been designated for the purchase, reconstruction and rehabilitation of the building, but other than construction of a new roof to the building and installation of an elevator, which were completed at a total cost of approximately $350,000, little additional construction and remodeling work was performed on or about and inside the now dilapidated building.

In and around November 2005, Humphrey and other co-conspirators, met and created false and fraudulent invoices and documents to include in a report which was submitted to HUD. Humphrey signed the report which contained a fraudulent document created to give the false impression that he was entitled to compensation and to conceal the fact that he had been taking grant funds for personal use since 2001, including the use of HUD grant monies for gambling and payment of his personal credit card.

The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorneys Joshua Judd, Jim Lesousky, and Joseph Ansari. It was investigated by the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development Office of Inspector General, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigations.