It appears Rebecca Ivison's trial for defrauding a USDA program will be delayed until April.
A federal grand jury indicted Rebecca Ivison of Jackson for money laundering, theft of government funds, and skimming from government rural housing loans in September 2025. The Justice Department obtained the indictment after Ivison backed out of a plea bargain deal.
The indictment charges Ivison with eight counts: structuring, false documents, equity skimming, theft of government money, money laundering (2), property mortgaged to federal credit agencies, and false documents.
Rural Housing Services is a credit agency within USDA-Rural Development. RHS provides financing for multi-family rental housing in rural areas. Such housing is oriented towards low-income, disabled, and the elderly. RD subsidizes the loans by providing rental assistance on behalf of the tenants to the borrower/owner (Ivison in this case.). Rents are limited to a percentage of the tenant's income. The program allows borrowers to charge rents affordable to low-income tenants due to loan terms superior to what borrowers can obtain from commercial banking.
The borrower must manage the property and comply with all federal regulations. RHS and RS prohibit secret "kinfolk deals." The borrower and management can not buy goods or services from a party that has a relationship with the borrower unless it is disclosed and approved.
Rebecca Case Ivison operates several companies that manage apartments participating in the Rural Housing Services and Rural Development programs at USDA. The indictment charges Ivison hired her son without seeking approval and illegally transferred USDA funds to their personal accounts (A synopsis posted below provides more information about the alleged crimes.).
The Justice Department withdrew the count of structuring earlier this month. The indictment alleged
Ivison wired $11,000 from her joint checking account held with her son to her personal checking account on December 19. However, she split the transfer into two transactions of $9,900 and $1,100. Federal law requires the bank to report all deposits over $10,000. It is illegal to break up the deposit into deposits under $10,000 to avoid the reporting requirement.
The defendant subsequently filed a motion to dismiss one of the counts of money laundering. As the structuring charge included the element of concealment, Case argued the money laundering count should be dismissed since the underlying charge (structuring/concealment) no longer existed.
Ivison is scheduled to go to trial in March. However, both parties filed a joint motion to continue the case until April 20. U.S. District Judge David Bramlett has not ruled on the motion nor the motion to dismiss.
Assistant U.S. Attorneys Kimberly Purdie and Herbie Carraway are prosecuting the case. Attorneys Candace Gregory and James Shelson represent the defendant.
The Justice Department seeks the forfeiture of all assets obtained through the alleged offenses. Ivison faces a maximum penalty of five years in prison and/or a $250,000 fine.
Synopsis of Case
The Justice Department filed a Bill of Information for Ivison on June 27. Bills of Information are used when the defendant waives indictment and agrees to plead guilty. The Information charged the defendant with one count if illegal structuring. The maximum penalty is 5 years in prison and/or $250,000 fine. However, Ivison had other ideas.
Ivison pleaded not guilty at her hearing before U.S. Magistrate LaKeysha Greer on August 22 and posted a $10,000 bond. As one can imagine, the feds were not too pleased with the defendant reneging on her plea deal. Prosecutors promptly went to the grand jury and obtained an indictment on September 23.
The indictment charges Ivison with eight counts: structuring, false documents, equity skimming, theft of government money, money laundering (2), property mortgaged to federal credit agencies, and false documents.
Rebecca Case Ivison operates several management companies: Complex Management, Inc., Delta Property Management, Inc., and Southern Management Group, LLC. that were owned by her late husband, Herbert Ivison. He died in 2014 at the age of 70.
There was a nasty fight in Scott County Chancery Court over the will between Rebeccas Ivison and her stepsons. The Chancellor awarded control of all of the businesses owned by Herbert Ivision's estate to the widow.
Herbert Ivison created Wicker Garden Designs, LLC in 2013 but dissolved it a year later. Rebecca Ivison revived the company in 2017. (Pay attention because this story is about to get complicated.)
Ivison (Rebecca) deposited $19,400 into the Wicker account in 2017. Nearly all of it came from companies she managed. She deposited another $79,975 later that year.
An unindicted co-conspirator deposited $11,666 into an account he shared with Ivison on December 18, 2017. $11,400 of the funds were fees he received to pressure wash Ivison properties financed by Rural Housing. The unindicted co-conspirator was her son.
The indictment charges Ivison did not disclose the relationship nor get approval for such a transaction as required.
Ivison wired $11,000 from her joint checking account held with her son to her personal checking account on December 19. However, she split the transfer into two transactions of $9,900 and $1,100. Federal law requires the bank to report all deposits over $10,000. It is illegal to break up the deposit into deposits under $10,000 to avoid the reporting requirement.
The indictment alleges all but $400 of the $11,000 her companies paid to her son went into her pocket. The Justice Department said the fraud continued as Ivison paid her son $33,600 in December 2017 to pressure wash more properties.
Junior purchased a 2016 Land Rover on December 26, 2017 for $94,851. The son paid $20,000 to the dealership while her mother paid $74,851 with a check from Wicker. The Ivison company received $79,975 from USDA in December 2017. USDA paid $556,604 to Wicker Garden Designs from 2017 to 2019.
The first count of the indictment charges Rebecca Ivison with illegal structuring her $11,000 2017 transfer to avoid reporting requirements. The second count alleges she filed a false document with USDA that did not include her son in a list of all "identities of interest"*
Ivison is charged with equity skimming. Wicker Gardens obtained RHS financing for Pachuta Apartments in Hickory. The indictment alleges she used the funds for something besides the expenses of managing the property. Such transactions must be authorized. The alleged transfer of funds from her joint account with her son to her personal account and the illegal structuring of deposits form the basis of the counts for money laundering.
The purchase of the Land Rover was facilitated by the "theft of government money, charges the indictment.
* How government terms those who have a relationship with the borrower: family, friends, business partners, etc.
2 comments:
That defense is costing her at least $800/hr.
Now we know the source and motivation for all those rural INSTASLUMS marring the countryside. Instead of evacuating the rural poor to places like Atlanta (where they could have actual futures, and competently-delivered resources), they're kept in the countryside, where resources are meager.
And they multiply.
Farmers are plagued by theft of farm chemicals and farm equipment (and invasions of farm dwellings - sometimes with unspeakably-horrible outcomes). And heaven forbid your car should break down, now, on a rural road. The Perps, for the most part, live in those rural instaslums.
Now, having done an image search, I have a face to attach to the problem. I also have an image of boxwood parterres, on a very expensive lake, and of redundant resurfacing of our old office condo's parking lot... ...by "management"...
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