Some criminals live a life of crime — this one led several lives, 26 of them at least, according to federal prosecutors.
Jessica Bailey Sowell, 32, of Charlotte, was part of an identity theft ring that used stolen credit cards and fake driver’s licenses to wrack up nearly a half-million dollars in debt, according to Russ Ferguson, US Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina.
While executing a search warrant in a hotel room where Sowell was staying, federal agents recovered a lavishly decorated weapon: “a Taurus G3 9mm handgun, bedazzled with sequins on the barrel,” prosecutors added.
Sowell ran up other people’s tabs buying anything from everyday items at Target and Walmart to high-end clothing and luxury cars during a year-long crime spree across the south, according to officials and reports.
“Sowell created fraudulent identification documents with the stolen personal identifying information, which she used at banks, hotels, and retail stores to obtain money and merchandise, and to rent hotel rooms and cars,” federal prosecutors said.
“Over the course of the investigation, law enforcement found letters, bank cards, and checks in Sowell’s possession that belonged to at least 26 victims of identity theft,” Ferguson said in a statement.
On Monday, she learned her fate.
“Sowell was sentenced to 57 months in prison followed by five years of supervised release for bank fraud, aggravated identity theft, and unlawful possession of a firearm,” according to prosecutors.
She was also ordered to pay restitution in the amount of $47,190.25.
Investigators seized a suitcase containing hundreds of pieces of mail with various names and addresses, and a second suitcase was packed with store-tagged merchandise.
Authorities also found two handwritten journals with the names and credit information of multiple victims; and 23 driver’s licenses from different states with Sowell’s photograph, according to prosecutors.
During a search of a rental vehicle Sowell was using, investigators found a credit card in the name of an ID theft victim, receipts for merchandise purchased with the victim’s credit card, an identity card printer and multiple blank identity cards as well as holographic stickers, prosecutors said.
At one point during the investigation, Sowell’s accomplice made a daring escape, leaping from a second-story hotel window as police were closing in on him, according to The Charlotte Observer.
Sowell’s crime spree started in October 2018, prosecutors said, when she and her three accomplices used people’s mail and real estate listings to steal their identities.
“The defendants used the stolen identities of real persons… to create identification cards in the victims’ names, but with the defendants’ photographs,” the indictment states. “Prosecutors said they opened credit cards at places such as Lowe’s, Walmart, Belk, Kohl’s and Target, and purchased vehicles from multiple CarMax dealerships in the Carolinas, Tennessee and Georgia.”
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