A 53-year-old first offender?
The man who made a near $250,000 profit in a land deal with the state pleaded guilty Monday to two misdemeanor charges.
The plea negotiation, struck just prior to opening statements in Richmond County Superior Court, gives Ashby Krouse III two years on probation and a $2,000 fine. The sentence is under the First Offender Act, which means if he successfully completes the probationary period no conviction will be registered against him.
The plea agreement also requires Mr. Krouse, 53, to refrain from using his Georgia real estate appraisal license and broker license during the next two years.
The state began an investigation of Mr. Krouse's sale of swampland to the state after The Augusta Chronicle uncovered the deal in 2005. Mr. Krouse bought the land for $25,000 and sold it to the state for $265,850.
Senior Assistant Attorney General David McLaughlin said after Monday's sentencing that he and Assistant Attorney General Laura Pfister were confident they could have proven the original charges of forgery and making false statements. Monday's plea negotiation, however, accomplished the twin goals of getting a conviction and getting Mr. Krouse out of the real estate business for two years.
Mr. Krouse pleaded guilty to two counts of obstruction for inconsistent testimony he gave under oath, and for submitting a document that wasn't what he represented it to be.
Lead defense attorney Pete Theodocion said there were a number of inconsistencies in witnesses' statements, probably because of the passage of time between when Mr. Krouse obtained the 98-acre site in south Augusta and when he sold it to the state of Georgia for use as wetlands.
The original deal was so ordinary that no one could remember the deals with specificity two years later, Mr. Theodocion said.
Mr. McLaughlin said there was no evidence that the sale of the land to the state was criminal.
There's no explanation for why the state Department of Transportation set its sights on that particular piece of land, but there's no evidence that anyone was coerced or entered into any conspiracy either, he said.
The state's own appraiser set the value of the land before Mr. Krouse was paid $265,850.
The original indictment accused Mr. Krouse of forgery and making false statements in documents submitted to the county government in the assessment and sale of the 89 acres in September 2002.
According to the investigation by The Chronicle , the day after Mr. Krouse obtained the property he met with a DOT biologist to discuss selling the property for wetlands. The meeting was set up by his father-in-law, former state Sen. Don Cheeks, who was a member of the Senate's transportation committee.
The committee's duties center on issues affecting the state's highways, railroads and inland waterways.
Monday's guilty pleas concerned Mr. Krouse's obstruction of the state's investigation of the land deal in 2005 and 2007.
Mr. Theodocion said the defense team is pleased with the outcome.
"We tried for a long time to work it out and we finally worked out an agreement that both sides could live with."
Reach Sandy Hodson at (706) 823-3226 or sandy.hodson@augustachronicle.com.
Comments
A 53-year-old first offender?
and 'Teflon Don' Cheeks does it again! What a guy!
Two thousand, that's all? The investigation cost ten times that and all he get's it two thousand and two years probation. Give me a break!
Does this mean that Ashby Krouse III gets to keep the $250,000? If so I hope Bill Hatcher sues him to recover the money that Krouse stole from him.
Does this mean that Ashby Krouse III gets to keep the $250,000? If so I hope Bill Hatcher sues him to recover the money that Krouse stole from him.
First offender status has nothing to do with age but whether or not its a duh First offense.
This has been going on since the beginning of land ownership. I see it is business as usual, not don't do it again but basically, don't get caught again.
Another clean get away by a white-collar criminal. Not a bad days pay, eh... Krouse. Did you file & pay taxes on that windfall? I wonder.
more scamming by a local politician, via his daughter's husband, and culminating after he leaves office. It's like the gift that keeps on giving. Thanks Don Cheeks.
The article says, "The state's own appraiser set the value of the land before Mr. Krouse was paid $265,850." I wonder if Ashby Krouse III was paying taxes based on this value $265,850?
I think Craig just thought it impossible for a person to make it to 53 without committing a crime
What a Sentence, only a politician could do it! Wonder how much the judge got?
Krouse made a good profit off this crime, close to $250,000. It is all in who you are and who you know. Someone shoplifting a $20.00 item would have received more time!!
If the state set the value then where is the crime-none. The only crime I see is if he forged someones' name. The taxes would be a short term gain on the difference between cost and sales price. It says above that the only thing the state says it could prove was forgery. Politics as usual.
If I remember right, the property was just a swamp that couldn't be timbered. After he bought it, the DOT all of the sudden said there was going to be a road put through there and the swamp could be timbered thus ,increasing the value....Basically the way I see it is insider trading.
Wow, that should encourage criminals to rip off people again and again. What a joke of a punishment. Why didn't they revoke either of his licenses?
Is this a surprise to anyone? Let's hope that the old saying about what goes around...and the $250,000 will go as fast as it came.
I wonder how much of the $250k profit Mr. Krouse had to pay to get this light sentence. I paid $2,800. to a lawyer down on the river to get my girlfriend's DUI fixed.
There sure is a lot of publicity about this son-in-law. But the adult SON of another well-known and highly placed state AND local official is a cocaine dealer arrested again early this year and not a peep in any of the media about that. Hope he's squealing on a lot of higher ups for the media to be this hush-hush about it. I'm not trying to "make a federal case outta this", rumor has it there already is one. There certainly seems to be a high rate of recidivism in this area.
Wow! This proves justice is not blind. Even the prosecutor stated they could prove forgery. Charles Walker went to court on the wrong day.
good job pete you have save another felon from condemnation.
surely he was not allowed to keep the profit from the sale. if so, crime does pay! i agree someone needs to follow the money to see whether he paid the IRS a capital gains tax on the property, plus investigate the amount richmond county valued that parcel for county taxes. perhaps someone or some entity will sue for their losses.
sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeettt!!!!
perhaps he did a tax free swap for a beach property or something........... why pay taxes?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ueEfRXZCVA .....please view Americans Freedoms being destroyed also http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=RfrcnAjcWZs and important too. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D3kBn1usddI
Nice little profit there!
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