10-Year Sentence For Identity Theft

SALISBURY -- A Salisbury man was sentenced to 10 years in prison last week after leading an identity theft scheme targeting at least 100 mental health patients and employees of a program that treated them.

U. S. District Judge Catherine Blake last week sentenced Christopher Andre Devine, 34, to 10 years in prison followed by five years of supervised release for conspiring to commit bank fraud and aggravated identity theft in connection with a scheme to use the personal information of dozens of individuals in a mental health program to open bank accounts and fraudulently obtain cash, merchandise and services.

According to his plea agreement, from December 2008 to December 2011, Devine and his co-defendants, Quanisha Williamson-Ross, Lenee Williamson and Quashona Williamson, opened or recruited others to open checking accounts at banks and obtain check cards. The conspirators then deposited fraudulent checks into the accounts and used the associated check cards at ATM machines to make cash withdrawals.
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