American Craft Beer The Best Craft Beer, Breweries, Bars, Brewpubs, Beer Stores, And Restaurants Serving Serious Beer.
In the annals of “Craft Beer Crime” there’s no minimizing the seriousness of the charges against Keith Ashley, who owns Nine Band Brewing in Allen, Texas.
This sounds bad…
On November 13, Nine Band Brewing owner Keith Todd Ashley was indicted on federal wire fraud charges. That on top of having been arrested for the murder of a man in Carrollton last week.
In addition to owning Nine Band Brewing, Ashley also worked in the financial sector. And he has been charged bilking investors out of more than $1.1 million via his company North Texas Money Management.
As explained in the indictment which was filed in the United States District Court last week, Ashley allegedly set up a series of bank accounts which were used as a conduit to receive funds from investors,” who believed that they were investing in legitimate, “no-risk” investments that would provide returns of up to 9 percent,” according to Eater Dallas….
“In reality, Ashley was using the accounts to shuffle the money for his own purposes, including operational expenses for Nine Band Brewing, payments on his own credit cards, mortgage payments, and gambling at casinos.”
But that’s just the beginning of Ashley’s problems. He’s already being held without bail for the murder of James Seegan, Ashley’s friend and financial advisor, who was found dead from a gunshot to the head in February, in what initially looked like suicide.
It started as what appeared to be a suicide,” Jolene DeVito, with the Carrollton Police Department told Fox 4 “But from the very start, there were some things that just did not feel right about it.”
“I think the detectives would tell you what stood out immediately was the positioning of the gun,” DeVito explained. The gun was found in the victim’s left hand and according to his wife Seegan was right handed.
Over a nine month investigation Texas investigation detectives found evidence that Ashley (who in addition to owning a brewery and a financial firm also worked as a nurse) “drugged Seegan and then murdered him in an attempt to gain control of his finances.”
Not surprisingly Nine Band Brewing’s website and Facebook presence are no longer active.
Want more beer crimes?
