A federal court judge sentenced a Kalispell man to five years of probation and over $200,000 in restitution for wire fraud.
Jesse Sharderic Wall, Jr., 66, received Chief U.S. District Judge Dana L. Christensen’s sentencing on July 12. Wall had pleaded guilty to the wire fraud charge. Along with five years of probation, Christensen ordered that Wall pay $201,305.85 in restitution.
According to federal court documents, Wall was a CPA in Kalispell when the crimes occurred. Starting in 2008, Wall made “material misrepresentations” to the RBM Lumber Company, convincing the company to invest $350,000 with him. One of the RBM executives told investigators that Wall was the company accountant at the time, and “he offered to invest some of RBM’s money in mediums that would produce a higher rate of return than RBM could get from a bank.”
The lumber company agreed, and began supplying Wall with various sums of money at various times. Wall created a Nevada corporation called Milestone Innovations, Inc., and “the money that RBM provided Wall was invested on behalf of that Nevada entity.”
But instead of depositing the money in any interest-bearing investments, Wall used the money from RBM to prop up his struggling business.
In February 2011, RBM asked Wall to return the money as per their agreement, but Wall was unable to do so. He had spent the money, but was hoping to sell his house and use that money to repay RBM. In June 2011, Wall repaid RBM $190,000.
That following December, the U.S. Secret Service interviewed Wall, and he said he did want to pay RBM back, but “perhaps did say something misleading to them,” to induce them to part with their money.