The manager of a small-town Minnesota grain elevator who allegedly treated himself to exotic hunting safaris with millions of dollars stolen from farmers plans to plead guilty to federal criminal charges, his lawyer said Thursday.
Jerry Hennessey, who managed the Ashby Farmers Cooperative Elevator Co. for nearly 30 years, plans to plead to charges of mail fraud and tax evasion at a hearing in U.S. District Court on Feb. 14, said Thomas Kelly, his attorney.
Hennessey could face up to 20 years in prison on the mail fraud charge and five years for tax evasion, although his actual sentence will be based on complex federal guidelines. He's estimated to have stolen about $5.5 million from the elevator company, according to Erik Ahlgren, a Fergus Falls lawyer hired by the co-op to recover the losses.
Chatty and personable, Hennessey was on a first-name basis with the world's most renowned big-game guides, paying $50,000 or more for hunting safaris in Africa, New Zealand and Alaska. He spent more than half a million dollars to have his trophies mounted and built a barn-sized addition to display them at his home outside Ashby, a town of 440 residents some 165 miles northwest of the Twin Cities.
Hennessey allegedly wrote dozens of checks to himself on the co-op's account, in amounts as large as $135,000, according to the criminal information. He used the money for a variety of personal expenses, including credit card debt, sporting equipment and recreational buildings.
Hennessey skipped town in early September, just as an $8 million bank loan to the elevator came due without assets to back it up. He was missing for nearly three months before turning himself in to authorities in early December.
Hennessey is "accepting responsibility for the action that he took," Kelly said. "And this is part of his remorse: the quick resolution of the criminal case and not putting the government to undue or unnecessary expense and time."
With Hennessey's "public recognition of his wrongdoing, which has been clear and swift, we hope the court takes that into consideration," Kelly added.
