Exec of Failed Bank Gets Eight Years in Prison for Fraud

A former executive at a Norfolk, Va., bank has been sentenced to eight years in federal prison for his role in the fraud that led to the bank's collapse.

Troy Brandon Woodard, son of Bank of the Commonwealth chief Edward Woodard, was also ordered to pay $2.4 million in restitution to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and to forfeit more $4 million in proceeds from the fraud.

He was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Raymond Jackson in the Eastern District of Virginia. A federal jury found Troy Woodard guilty of conspiracy to commit bank fraud and three counts of unlawful participation in a loan in May.

Troy Woodard was vice president and a mortgage loan specialist at Bank of the Commonwealth when he participated in a scheme to make loans to the bank's two largest borrowers in exchange for favors, according to a press release from the Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program. The borrowers used proceeds from the loans to bail him out of failed real estate investments and to purchase his personal condominium.

The younger Woodard also persuaded his father to use bank funds to pay for his personal legal expenses and accepted thousands of dollars in commission fees for referring commercial loans to the bank, according to prosecutors.

"When faced with the prospect of financial hardship brought by [Troy Woodard's] own risky choices, he repeatedly ran to his father and co-conspirators for his own personal bailouts at the expense of the bank, a bank that had applied for Tarp despite fraud on its books including funds that paid for [Troy Woodard's] expenses," Christy Romero, the special inspector general for Tarp, said in the release. "This culture of corruption and entitlement was pervasive in the bank's leadership."

Troy Woodard is one of several people headed to prison for their roles in the bank fraud scheme. Senior loan officer Stephen Fields was sentenced to 17 years in federal prison in September. Bank customer Dwight Etheridge was sentenced to roughly four years in prison that month. Meanwhile, Edward Woodward is scheduled to be sentenced on Nov. 6.