The sentence for Fred James Engh, who admitted to operating a multistate retail theft crime ring, was reduced Wednesday by two years because his attorney miscalculated the defendant’s sentencing range.
“It’s merely correcting an error,” said Clark County Superior Court Judge Suzan Clark. “The court’s intention was to give the highest sentence under the law … and the court was given incorrect information.”
Engh’s prison sentence is now eight years.
In an agreement with prosecutors, Engh, 31, of Vancouver, pleaded guilty June 26 to leading organized crime, money laundering and bail jumping. In exchange, Deputy Prosecutor Michelle Nisle agreed to dismiss 54 other felony charges related to the crime ring.
Clark then sentenced Engh to the maximum sentence allowed under the law. In Engh’s signed guilty statement, his attorney, Josephine Townsend, wrote that the maximum sentence for the money laundering conviction was 120 months, or 10 years.
In fact, Townsend said Wednesday, the maximum is eight years.
Townsend and Nisle had jointly recommended a sentence of eight years. Clark, citing Engh’s lack of remorse, sentenced Engh to 10 years.
“The court is not particularly impressed with your arrogance and with your kind of dodging the facts in this case,” Clark said at the time, according to a transcript. “This is … very serious, incredible impact on the community.”
In addition to his prison term, Engh also is required to serve 18 months of probation and forfeit all of his assets, including a $150,000 house, about $100,000 in cash and other personal property.
Engh was the ringleader of a network of shoplifters who stole merchandise and then returned it for store credit on a gift card, according to court documents. The shoplifters, often called “boosters,” then sold the gift cards to Engh for 40 to 75 percent of their value, and he resold the gift cards online, according to court documents.
The crime ring operated for at least three years in Washington, Oregon and Nevada, officials say. Nisle said 35 retailers were victims of the illegal enterprise.
Nisle said that JC Penney reported a 63 percent decline in return activity after Engh’s arrest in May 2013. That store lost about $5 million during a five-year period due to fraudulent returns; Safeway lost about $2 million, Nisle said.
“I knew what people were doing, and I wasn’t directly involved in telling them — most of them — what to do,” Engh said, according to the transcript.
He was arrested in May 2013 on suspicion of operating the crime ring. He posted bail and then fled to Mexico that July. He was apprehended in early November of that year and has been in Clark County Jail since then in lieu of $1 million bail.
Some issues of his case are under appeal, Townsend said Wednesday.
