United States District Judge John W. deGravelles sentenced William Todd Cutrer, of Addis, to 42 months in federal prison for fraudulently obtaining over $500,000 from victim investors in an investment fraud scheme. The Court also ordered Cutrer to pay $502,035.09 in restitution to his victims. Cutrer will be required to serve a two-year term of supervised release upon his release from prison.
Cutrer pled guilty to one count of mail fraud in October 2017. Cutrer owned and operated West Baton Rouge Credit, Inc. (WBRC), a small loan company located in Port Allen. Cutrer obtained funds to operate WBRC by personally soliciting investments from individual investors. According to his guilty plea, Cutrer promised investors he would pay interest on their investments and that their funds could be redeemed at any time upon written notice. Instead of using the funds as promised, however, Cutrer admitted that he wrote checks to himself and his family members, and made payments to prior investors who were due interest on their principal. When Cutrer failed to make the payments he owed to his victim investors, he acknowledged sending them a letter falsely claiming that because of the August 2016 flood, he was having difficulty collecting payments on WBRC’s high-interest loans.
This matter was investigated by the Securities Division of the Office of Financial Institutions and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The prosecution of Cutrer was handled by the United States Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Louisiana.