Chattooga County inmate charged with selling more than $1 million in construction equipment from cell

Mar. 25—A federal indictment has been handed down for a prisoner at Hays State Prison for allegedly orchestrating a scam that involved him selling more than $1 million in construction equipment from his cell in Chattooga County, Georgia.

While an inmate at Hays State in Trion, Damon Thomas Young allegedly devised a scheme to defraud heavy equipment dealers and financial lenders by calling companies and pretending to be a purchasing officer with AbbVie Inc., a company based in Chicago.

In the summer and fall of 2019, Young used the alias Morgan Sylvia to conduct the scheme, according to the indictment. Young ordered nearly $1.5 million in heavy construction equipment, some of which he had delivered to his parents' address in Ranger, Georgia.

Young then would resell the equipment to unsuspecting buyers and "fraudulently obtained financing and insurance coverage for the equipment," according to the indictment.

In order to further legitimize the scheme, Young put the actual names of three of AbbVie's corporate officers on credit applications and forged the signature of the company's CFO.

The indictment states Young had started the scam as far back as July 2019.

Young tried to sell equipment from two companies: Ascendum Machinery (which has a location in Chattanooga) and Border Equipment.

In total, Young is being charged with 21 counts of wire fraud and two counts of aggravated identity theft.

Young had been in prison for multiple charges including arson and assault.

Contact Patrick Filbin at pfilbin@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6476. Follow him on Twitter @PatrickFilbin.