Former banker pleads guilty for role in Texas bank's failure

A former president at Enloe State Bank in Cooper, Texas, has pleaded guilty to federal charges of conspiracy to commit bank fraud.

Anita Gail Moody also pleaded guilty to arson in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, the Justice Department said in a Monday press release.

Moody was president of the bank when it failed on May 31, 2019.

Moody admitted to starting a fire in the bank's boardroom on May 11, 2019, to destroy phony loan documents she had created in the names of bank customers and others, according to the release. She also admitted using money fraudulently obtained from the fake loan documents to fund a boyfriend's business, friends' businesses and her own lifestyle.

The fraudulent activity, which began in 2012, resulted in a loss to the bank of about $11 million, the release said.

Moody agreed to a sentence of 84 months in federal prison and will pay restitution of more than $11.1 million.

While Legend Bancorp in Bowie, Texas, bought all of the $36.7 million-asset Enloe's insured deposits, it purchased just 14% of its assets. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. estimated at the time that the failure would cost the Deposit Insurance Fund roughly $27 million, or three-fourths of Enloe's asset size.