WüRZBURG, Germany — A Katterbach-based soldier who bounced $28,000 worth of checks at Army and Air Force Exchange Service stores was sentenced Monday to 100 days in jail.
Pfc. Jeremy Redman, 20, of the 1st Infantry Division’s 1st Battalion, 1st Aviation Regiment, pleaded guilty to two counts of check fraud, said Capt. Sean Condron, senior trial counsel in the 1st ID’s Staff Judge Advocate office. Besides the jail sentence, a military judge in Würzburg also ordered him reduced to the lowest enlisted rank.
The two counts were for 60 bad checks passed at AAFES stores, and for one given to a Sixt car rental agency.
Condron said Redman’s check-writing spree began Feb. 27 and ended a month later. During that time, he wrote bad checks at AAFES facilities in Katterbach, Vilseck and Würzburg, ranging in amounts from $12 to $3,466.21. The checks were written against an account from the Randolph Brooks Federal Credit Union in Texas.
Most were written to pay for electronics equipment, stereos, DVDs and compact discs, Condron said, but Redman also bought drinks and cigarettes for himself and his friends. To celebrate his birthday, he rented a Mercedes.
Redman cooperated with authorities in recovering and returning to AAFES as many of the goods as he could, according to Condron. The sentence did not include any forfeiture of pay.
Redman had worked as an aircraft mechanic in Battery D of the 1-1 Aviation Battalion, part of the 1st ID’s aviation brigade. Part of the unit is scheduled to deploy to Iraq next spring.
