A federal judge last week sentenced Eulice Emerson Alvey of Nome, Texas to 57 months in prison for his role in a multimillion-dollar loan fraud scheme that exploited credit union member accounts to fund fictitious purchases of farm equipment, federal prosecutors said.
U.S. District Court Judge Marcia A. Crone in Beaumont also ordered Alvey to pay $2,075,458 in restitution and serve five years of supervised released following his prison term. He pleaded guilty to one felony count of conspiracy to commit bank fraud in August 2024.
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Alvey, an ex-manager of Oil City Tractors in Beaumont, and Billy Ray Thomas Jr., a former assistant branch manager at the $1 billion Neches Federal Credit Union in Port Neches, began their scheme in 2015.
Prosecutors said Alvey created fraudulent purchase invoices for farm equipment from Oil City Tractor, and sent them to Thomas. Thomas then used the personal information of 30 credit union members, without their knowledge or consent, to request loans for the farm equipment. After the loans were approved, the two men split the funds and used the money for personal and business expenses.
To avoid detection, Thomas made cash payments on the loans. However, in fall 2018, credit union members began reporting unauthorized loans in their names.
A Neches FCU internal investigation revealed that Thomas used family members and acquaintances as borrowers.
Some of the credit union member victims said they never signed paper documents, or only signed electronically on a tablet provided by Thomas. Others said they signed paper documents but did not understand what they were signing because they implicitly trusted Thomas, prosecutors said.
Thomas was sentenced in April to 34 months in prison. He was ordered to pay $1,363,825 in restitution.
Peter Strozniak can be reached at [email protected].
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Peter Strozniak
Credit Union Times reporter covering credit union operations, fraud, M&As, leagues, business continuity, and breaking news.
