WASHINGTON – A former Kansas bank executive was charged in an indictment filed today for his participation in a bank fraud scheme to obtain a $15 million construction loan from 26 Kansas banks based on allegedly false information contained in the loan documents.

Troy A. Gregory, 50, of Lawrence, Kansas, was charged in an indictment filed in the District of Kansas with one count of conspiracy to commit bank fraud, four counts of bank fraud, and two counts of false statements.

According to the indictment, Gregory was a bank executive and loan officer who had made millions of dollars in loans to a group of borrowers who were struggling to make payments on the loans.

The indictment alleges that beginning in approximately late 2007, Gregory began the process of making a $15.2 million construction loan to build an apartment complex to that same group of borrowers.  The indictment further alleges that Gregory’s bank shared this loan with 25 other Kansas banks.

Gregory allegedly made or caused others to make false statements to the banks about the strength of the borrowers, the debt status of the apartment property and the existence of approximately $1.7 million in certificates of deposit for collateral on the loan, all to get the loan approved.

Instead of using the loan funds promised for building the apartments, Gregory allegedly immediately diverted over $1 million of the loan to pay for part of the certificates of deposit pledged as collateral, pay off debt on the apartment property and make payments on unrelated loans.  Other Kansas banks that shared in this loan allegedly would not have participated in the loan without the false representations and promises.

The indictment alleges that the banks ultimately wrote off millions of dollars on the $15.2 million construction loan.

RENO COUNTY — CHS announced Friday that they will close their soy processing facility in Hutchinson immediately, eliminating some 80 jobs.

Questions about the future of the facility had been hovering for several weeks, but officially came in an announcement to employees Friday morning.

Annette Degnan, Marketing and Communications Director for CHS confirmed the closing stating that the the facility is one of three that will shut down. Degnan says that over the last 11 months CHS tried to sell the facility and keep the workforce intact but market conditions and other factors left the company without a buyer.

CHS purchased Legacy Foods LLC in 2008 and made major upgrades to the facility. At the time, the company was considered one of the nation’s premier producers of Ultra Soy® (textured soybean-based food products) and TSP® (a textured soy protein) used around the world by manufacturers of human- and pet-food products.

Sources say employees will be paid through the end of the month.

 

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas is reporting that it collected $8.5 million more in taxes than anticipated in November.

It was the sixth consecutive month with higher-than-expected revenues.

The Department of Revenue reported Friday that the state collected $463.5 million in taxes last month. The official projection was $455 million, and the surplus is 1.9 percent.

It was the first monthly report on tax collections since state officials revised revenue projections Nov. 2. The state’s new fiscal forecast is more optimistic than the previous one issued in April.

Since the budget year began in July, the state has collected nearly $2.5 billion in revenues, also $8.5 million more than expected.

Tax collections this year are 11.7 percent ahead of last year’s collections. Lawmakers increased income taxes earlier this year to help balance the budget.

BUTLER COUNTY — Law enforcement authorities have completed an investigation of a suspicious vehicle following a Kansas girl home Thursday in Butler County.

Police reported Friday morning they were able, through some tips and leads from the public, to track down a local business that was doing a holiday scavenger hunt with their employees in the Crescent Lakes area.

There were 6 vehicles involved including a couple of white SUVs and multiple individuals. One of the items on the scavenger hunt list was a picture of a girl walking a dog. We had a similar incident in the green valley area where a group approached a women walking a dog, we started putting things together, and tracked down the business.

We have confirmed that the girl in the Crescent Lakes addition was actually walking her dog at the time of the incident and ran off when approached. The driver of the vehicle confirmed the child’s story. The local business has apologized directly to the family for some poor judgement by their employees.

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BUTLER COUNTY— Law enforcement authorities are investigating report of a suspicious vehicle following a Kansas girl home in Butler County.

Just before 5:00 p.m., Thursday, an 11-year old girl in the Crescent Lakes addition near the park at Westchester and Woodstone in Andover reported that while walking home she was followed by a man and a woman in a white SUV, according to a social media report from police.

At one point the vehicle pulled alongside her and the woman passenger in the vehicle opened the passenger door, at which point the child ran off.

Approximately 15 to 20 minutes later after arriving home the girl’s family contacted police. Officers immediately saturated the area but were unable to locate any suspects.

Police are looking for a white SUV driven by a white male, mid-40’s, thin build and bald. The passenger in the vehicle was a white female, maybe mid-40s, heavy set, shoulder length blonde hair, wearing a pink shirt.

USD 385 in Andover also notified parents about the Thursday night incident.

On Wednesday, Hutchinson police reported an attempted child abduction near Faris Elementary School. Police and USD 308 officials continue to investigate that incident.

Anyone with information is asked to contact the Andover Police Department, 316-733-5177. Parents are encouraged to be vigilant and the police department will have extra officers in the neighborhoods over the next several days.

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Tennessee has scheduled an afternoon conference and is expected to provide an update on its tumultuous, embarrassing search for a football coach.

The news conference will be led by Chancellor Beverly Davenport, not athletic director John Currie, who has been forced out according to multiple reports.

Currie served as Athletic Director at Kansas State from 2009 until taking over as Vice Chancellor, Director of Athletics in Knoxville in February.

Currie fired Butch Jones last month and was close to hiring Ohio State defensive coordinator Greg Schiano on Sunday. That deal fell through amid a public backlash. Currie met Thursday with Washington State coach Mike Leach in Los Angeles.

Reports this week linked Oklahoma State’s Mike Gundy and Purdue’s Jeff Brohm to Tennessee’s vacancy, but both stayed put. North Carolina State’s Dave Doeren agreed to a new contract Thursday after speaking with Tennessee officials.

KANSAS CITY (AP) — Court documents say a Kansas City man has been charged with killing his wife after the couple’s 7-year-old daughter told a school counselor that she had found a body and “didn’t want to be next.”

Forty-five-year-old Benjamin Byers was charged Thursday with second-degree murder, armed criminal action, abandonment of a corpse and child endangerment in the death of Melissa Byers. Bond is set at $500,000. No attorney is listed for him in online court records.

The probable cause statement says the girl last saw her mother alive Monday. The statement says she talked to a counselor Wednesday after finding “lots of blood” and a body with a “stab on the back.” The girl said her father had been acting “weird” and she didn’t tell him what she had seen because she “didn’t want to be next.”

By JIM MCLEAN
Kansas News Service

Kansas Congressman Kevin Yoder is offering a vigorous defense of the Republican tax cut bill as the U.S. Senate prepares to vote on its version of the controversial measure.

In a lengthy news release posted Thursday that Yoder touted as separating myth from fact, the 3rd District representative said the bill does not favor wealthy taxpayers over middle-class families, as Democrats and other critics claim.

Noting that most taxpayers do not itemize, Yoder said critics are making too much of proposals to reduce or eliminate some deductions to offset the cost of a sharp reduction in the corporate tax.

In particular, he argues that middle-class families, which he defines as those making the median income of $59,000, would not be adversely affected by the House proposal to cap the itemized deduction for state and local taxes at $10,000 or the Senate plan to eliminate it.

“The middle class is by and large not benefitting from the state and local tax deduction,” Yoder said in the release, noting that most middle-income taxpayers do not claim itemized deductions.

“We significantly lower the tax burden for middle class and low-income Americans by doubling the size of the standard deduction — making the first $24,000 in a family’s income and the first $12,000 of an individual’s income tax-free,” he said, noting that the measure also preserves tax credits that generally help low-income families.

‘Toward an economic cliff’

But critics of the bill insist that wealthy Americans will benefit the most, noting that reductions for individuals would be temporary while corporate tax cuts would be permanent.

“The (Republican) party is now trying to pass a scam that throws a few crumbs to the middle class (temporarily — millions of middle-class Americans will soon see a tax hike if the bill is enacted) while heaping benefits on the super-rich, multiplying the national debt and endangering the American economy,” historian Robert McElvaine wrote in the Washington Post.

McElvaine, the author of a book on the Great Depression, sees echoes of the policies that precipitated the 1929 crash in the current GOP tax cut bill.

“Nine decades later, Republicans are rushing to do it again — and they are sprinting toward an economic cliff,” McElvaine wrote while warning of “catastrophic” results.

Critics of the bill say reducing the tax rate on “pass-through” business income is another way it benefits the wealthy by taxing them at a lower rate than many middle-class Americans. And they often point to Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback’s failed tax-cutting experiment as evidence that such “trickle down” policies don’t work.

Different than Kansas plan

Yoder said it’s unfair to compare the GOP tax bill to the Brownback plan, which state lawmakers largely repealed last session.

For one thing, he said the federal bill would only reduce taxes on pass-through business income, not exempt it as Brownback’s plan did.

“Our plan reduces the federal rate to 25 percent, which will allow American small businesses to compete at a level similar to that of other nations around the world without irresponsibly eliminating taxes all together,” he said in the release.

Yoder’s defense of the tax bill Thursday comes as the U.S. Senate is nearing a vote on its version.

Kansas Republican Sen. Pat Roberts supports the measure. But the state’s other GOP senator, Jerry Moran, has expressed concerns about its projected $1.5 billion impact on the federal budget deficit and provisions that would tax the university tuition waivers of graduate teaching assistants and repeal the Obamacare requirement that Americans purchase health coverage.

In a statement on his website, Moran said he is still “discussing ways to improve” the bill but is likely to vote for it regardless of the outcome of those discussions.

“I expect to support a tax package that grows the economy, protects taxpayers, creates good-paying jobs and helps Americans keep more of their hard-earned money,” Moran said.

Jim McLean is managing director of the Kansas News Service. You can reach him on Twitter @jmcleanks.