JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A 47-year-old Texas man will spend over five years in federal prison for manufacturing counterfeit Federal Reserve notes, false representation of a Social Security number and aggravated identity theft.
The court also ordered Joe Eugene Loving to pay restitution to the businesses he defrauded.
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According to the court documents, on Feb. 2, 2015, the Green Cove Springs Police Department received information that two individuals, later identified as Loving and John Thomas Humphreys, 46, were manufacturing counterfeit Federal Reserve notes in their hotel room at the Astoria Hotel in Clay County. The two men had active arrest warrants for parole violations in Texas and were subsequently arrested at the hotel by deputies from the Clay County Sheriff’s Office. Deputies found a counterfeit $100 note on Loving after his arrest.
During an interview with law enforcement, Humphreys and Loving stated, among other things, that they had been involved in a drug deal in Texas in December 2014 and had been on the run ever since. They estimated printing and passing at least $10,000 in counterfeit currency. In addition, they printed counterfeit checks using the identities of others.
During a subsequent search of the hotel room, agents located a box of personal identification information and financial documents belonging to other individuals, a printer/scanner/copier with counterfeit checks lying on top of it, counterfeit currency, and various computer media which had been used to manufacture the counterfeit currency.
On Nov. 10, Humphreys was sentenced to four years and six months in federal prison for his role in this case. He was also ordered to pay restitution to the businesses he had defrauded.
A third individual, Paul Corbin Pennington Jr., was also charged in this case for passing counterfeit currency. Pennington, a maintenance worker at the Astoria Hotel, loaned Loving and Humphreys his computer. Loving and Humphreys used the computer to print counterfeit checks. Pennington confessed to law enforcement officers that he had passed counterfeit currency in Clay County.
On Oct. 13, Pennington was sentenced to 141 days in federal prison and was ordered to pay restitution to the businesses he had defrauded.
This case was investigated by the Green Cove Springs Police Department, the Clay County Sheriff’s Office, and the United States Secret Service Jacksonville Field Office.