Madison Man Admits Defrauding Banks to Keep Equipment-Financing Business Afloat

Deirdre M. Daly, Acting United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut; Kimberly K. Mertz, Special Agent in Charge of the New Haven Division of the FBI; and Phil Hall, Acting Special Agent in Charge of IRS Criminal Investigation in New England, announced that WILLIAM LECKEY, 47, of Madison, waived his right to indictment and pleaded guilty today before United States District Judge Janet Bond Arterton in New Haven to engaging in a scheme to defraud financial institutions of more than $1 million.

“This defendant repeatedly lied to banks defrauding them of over a million dollars,” stated Acting U.S. Attorney Daly. “He did so in hopes of salvaging his business. Bank fraud schemes are never the right course of action for struggling business owners. Those who ignore this advice may well find themselves facing federal criminal charges,”

“As is evident by today’s guilty plea, Mr. Leckey took a series of calculated steps to mislead financial institutions and commit bank fraud for the purpose of keeping afloat his financing business,” stated FBI Special Agent in Charge Mertz. “Mr. Leckey’s conduct was self-serving and without regard for the considerable harm he has caused the victim banks.”

“IRS Criminal Investigation uses all its investigative tools to uncover financial fraud schemes,” stated IRS-CI Acting Special Agent in Charge Hall. “With today’s guilty plea, William Leckey admitted he defrauded financial institutions of over $1 million and used those funds for operating capital for his business. IRS Criminal Investigation is proud to bring our forensic accounting skills to this joint investigation to help uncover this and other types of financial crime.”

According to court documents and statements made in court, from approximately 2002 until 2012, LECKEY was the president and owner of Anchor Capital Services, Inc. (ACS), which provided financing to companies looking to purchase heavy equipment, such as tractor-trailer trucks, dump trucks, backhoes, and other similar types of equipment. ACS provided its customers with high-interest rate leases and funded the transactions through lines of credit it had available with various financial institutions. ACS would draw down on the lines of credit it had with these financial institutions by pledging its lease agreements and the related equipment as collateral. After each deal was funded by the financial institutions, ACS’ customer would make monthly payments to ACS on the lease, and ACS would use those funds to pay down the line of credit with the bank.

In pleading guilty, LECKEY admitted that he and others engaged in a long-running fraud scheme to obtain money from financial institutions to use as operating capital for ACS. As part of the scheme, LECKEY and others made false representations to the financial institutions that ACS had entered into lease transactions with customers for specified pieces of heavy equipment when, in fact, they knew that no such lease transaction had been conducted or the transaction never transpired after the lease had been signed. As a result of these false statements, the financial institutions funded these non-existent transactions in amounts well in excess of $100,000 on a number of occasions. On one occasion in October 2010, LECKEY created a bogus customer to serve as the purported lessee of the equipment, and proceeded to defraud the financial institution into releasing $150,000 to ACS.

As a result of this scheme, ACS received more than $1 million from financial institutions on its letters of credit.

LECKEY pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit bank fraud. Judge Arterton has scheduled sentencing for October 28, 2013, at which time LECKEY faces a maximum term of imprisonment of 30 years.

This matter is being investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Internal Revenue Service-Criminal Investigation. The case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Paul A. Murphy.