Summary

On February 14, 2014, in U.S. District Court, Nashville, Tennessee, Michael Young pleaded guilty to theft of federal funds.  

Young was the owner of two corporations contracted by the Tennessee Department of Transportation (TDOT) to manage right of way acquisitions on behalf of TDOT. Young executed a scheme to obtain over $900,000 from TDOT by falsely representing that he would procure right of way properties with the proceeds. Instead,  the money was used to manage other personal properties and financial obligations Young had incurred outside of TDOT's right of way acquisitions.

Young was further charged under forfeiture statutes and stands to forfeit real property traceable to the theft of federal funds in the approximate amount of $900,000.

We conducted this investigation jointly with the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Internal Revenue Service – Criminal Investigations with assistance from the TDOT Internal Audit Division.