MADISON, WIS. — This is an official press release from the U.S. Department of Justice (USAO - Wisconsin, Western), published as received.
MADISON, WIS. – Timothy M. O’Shea, Acting United States Attorney for the Western District of Wisconsin, announced that Michael Eisenga, 49, Columbus, Wisconsin, was sentenced yesterday by U.S. District Judge William M. Conley to 42 months in federal prison for loan fraud. The prison term is to be followed by a five-year term of supervised release. Eisenga pled guilty to the charge on March 25, 2021. He was also ordered to pay restitution of approximately $4,000,000. Eisenga was ordered to begin serving his sentence in July, when he will report to prison.
Eisenga owned several businesses, including CCC Lot 2, LLC, which was a Wisconsin company with its principal place of business in Columbus, Wisconsin. On behalf of CCC Lot 2, Eisenga sought and obtained from a credit union in Illinois, a $6.9 million commercial mortgage. He convinced the credit union to issue the loan by representing, among other things, that he had already secured Festival Foods Inc. as a tenant for the property through a 20-year lease agreement and that another company, Supervalue Holdings Inc., had guaranteed the lease.
After Eisenga defaulted on the loan, the credit union ultimately discovered that the signatories on the purported lease and lease guarantee that Eisenga gave to the credit union never signed the documents nor did their respective companies enter into any such agreements with Eisenga. The documents were wholly fraudulent and no such lease or lease guarantee ever existed.
The charge against Eisenga was the result of an investigation conducted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The United States would also like to acknowledge the assistance of the U.S. Trustee’s Office for the Western District of Wisconsin. The prosecution of the case has been handled by Assistant U.S. Attorney Meredith P. Duchemin.
