RALEIGH – A Conway man may spend the rest of his life behind bars following his guilty plan in Federal Court here last week.

United States Attorney George E.B. Holding announced in federal court on February 24 that Byron Javonne Deloatch, 43, pled guilty before United States District Judge Terrence W. Boyle to one count of mail fraud and two counts of bank fraud.

At sentencing, set for May 31, Deloatch faces up to 20 years’ imprisonment on the mail fraud count and up 30 years’ imprisonment for each bank fraud count.

A Federal Grand Jury returned a Superseding Criminal

Indictment on April 21, 2010.

In 2007, the United States Postal Inspection Service was

contacted by an employee of GE Money regarding the activities of Deloatch. It was determined that between August 30, 2001, and May 2007, Deloatch opened approximately 14 business credit card accounts and attempted to open at least 46 business credit card accounts with Wal*Mart, Sam’s Club, Lowes and others using fictitious business names and addresses

The investigation determined Deloatch would open the

accounts in one of three ways: mailing the application, applying via the internet, or applying for the account in person in the store. Once Deloatch applied for the business credit card, the card and subsequent statements would be mailed to him at a relative’s post office box address.

Deloatch would then use the credit card to purchase items.

Although he would make check payments on the accounts, all of the checks were returned as either non-sufficient funds, account closed, or no such account. This form of payment served to return available credit to the account allowing Deloatch to make additional purchases when the checks were in transit, thereby allowing purchase amounts to exceed the original credit line.

The investigation also revealed that Deloatch opened

approximately nine business credit card accounts with Citigroup Financial using fictitious business names and addresses. Because of the scheme, GE Money and Citigroup Financial suffered losses of approximately $200,000.

Investigation of this case was conducted by the United States Postal Inspection Service. Assistant United States Attorney Felice McConnell Corpening represented the government.