Prosecution seeks full restitution in city theft

An ex-employee who was sentenced to three years for the crime should repay $260,000, prosecutors now insist.

By WILLIAM R. LEVESQUE

© St. Petersburg Times, published July 28, 2000

LARGO -- Erroyl C. Bing Sr. was sentenced to three years in prison earlier this month for stealing $260,000 from the city of St. Petersburg.

Was the price of his crime steep enough?

Pinellas prosecutors don't think so. On Thursday, prosecutors asked a circuit judge to reconsider her decision ordering Bing, the city's former warehouse manager, to pay just $10,000 restitution to the city.

"In effect, the court allowed the defendant to get away with $250,000 for his own benefit without being held fully accountable," said prosecutor Janet Olney.

Circuit Judge Dee Anna Farnell, who sentenced Bing on July 17 after offering him the plea deal over prosecutors' objection, delayed a decision on the request until at least Aug. 24.

Until then, she rescinded an order that Bing surrender at the Pinellas County Jail by Aug. 21 to begin serving his term.

If Farnell does order Bing to pay back the full $260,000 he stole, the judge said she would allow Bing, if he desires, to withdraw his guilty plea since a condition of the plea deal would have been changed.

"My concern is whether the court abused its discretion in not allowing the state to be heard at a restitution hearing," Farnell said.

Bing, 45, pleaded guilty July 17 to two grand theft charges. He pleaded guilty after Farnell offered him this deal: three years in prison and the payment of $10,000 restitution for a theft spanning two years, ending in April 1999.

Prosecutors were incensed. Bing, who also served time for theft in federal prison during the 1980s, had faced 15 years in prison. But what angered them most was the $10,000 restitution.

The judge reasoned the city only lost $10,000, the amount of its insurance deductible. The rest of Bing's theft -- $249,237.66 -- had been covered by an insurance company.

The city also said it was owed up to $55,000 in investigative costs.

At the time, Farnell said the insurer or the city could collect anything else they are owed by filing a civil suit against Bing.

Prosecutor Fred Schaub argued earlier this month that the insurance company was also a victim and that consumers pay for the theft through higher rates. Bing, he said, should be ordered to pay everything.

"Why force them to go to the expense of filing a civil suit?" Schaub said in an interview shortly after Bing's plea.

Bing's lawyer, Anthony Battaglia, told Farnell on Thursday that prosecutors could have presented testimony from representatives of the insurance company before Bing's plea to testify about their loss.

"They could have done it," Battaglia said. "They chose not to do it for whatever reasons."

But Olney reminded Battaglia that Bing, at the time of his plea, never challenged that he had actually stolen about $260,000.

And she said a city auditor did testify about the insurance company's loss.

Bing said he had a $400-a-day crack cocaine habit and stole money from the city to feed his habit. Prosecutors don't believe him, noting he spent a lot of money on luxury items that had nothing to do with drugs or alcohol.

Bing fooled the city into paying for supplies it never received at its warehouse, from picnic tables to plumbing supplies.

The city didn't know when it hired him that he had a prior theft conviction in federal court and had served 18 months in prison.

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