A former NFL football player from East St. Louis, his business partner and their bookkeeper were indicted last Wednesday by a federal grand jury on fraud charges linked to money released in a COVID-19 relief program for their business.
Dana Howard, a state champion at East St. Louis High School and an All-American linebacker at the University of Illinois before being drafted by the Dallas Cowboys and playing for the St. Louis Rams, was named in the indictment along with his business partner, Richard Scott Myers, and bookkeeper Glenn Sunnquist.
Howard, 52, faces nine counts on criminal charges related to wire fraud, bankruptcy fraud, failure to pay federal taxes and conspiracy. Meyers faces eight counts and Sunnquist three counts.
Howard and Myers are co-owners of Zoie LLC, a construction company in East St. Louis. The two applied for and received a nearly $1.43 million loan through the federal Paycheck Protection Program, or PPP, which was implemented in 2020 to help small businesses meet certain expenses and keep people employed during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The indictment alleges the two used cashier’s checks and wire transfers to funnel the loan funds through banks in St. Louis, Edwardsville and Champaign for personal use. In one instance, according to the charges, Myers used $250,000 of the PPP money to buy a house.
Howard and Myers then each filed personal Chapter 11 bankruptcy while failing to disclose assets obtained through the fraudulent loan, including hundreds of thousands in cashier’s checks and the house in Madison County, the indictment alleges.
Sunnquist, their bookkeeper, is accused of falsifying and doctoring spreadsheets, invoices, rental agreements and other records to show that Zoie LLC used the PPP funds on qualified expenses so that Howard and Myers would then be eligible to have the loan forgiven.
The alleged scheme began in April 2020 and continued from October 2022, according to the indictment.
Howard and Myers declined to comment Friday. Sunnquist could not be reached.
Federal charges
Howard, who resides in Edwardsville, was charged with two counts of wire fraud as well as charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, false statement, bankruptcy fraud false bankruptcy declaration, bankruptcy fraud false statement under oath in a bankruptcy case and three counts of willful failure to pay over taxes in 2020.
Myers faces two counts of wire fraud, as well as charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, false statement, monetary transaction in funds derived from specified unlawful activity, two counts of bankruptcy fraud false bankruptcy declaration and bankruptcy fraud false statement under oath in a bankruptcy case.
Sunnquist faces one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and two counts of wire fraud.
According to federal sentencing guidelines, each count of wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud carries a maximum prison sentence of 20 years in addition to financial penalties. Bankruptcy fraud is punishable for up to five years per count plus fines, the guidelines say.
Wire fraud
The 21-page indictment alleges that Howard and Myers applied for and received a nearly $1.43 million loan through the federal Payroll Protection Program in April 2020.
Funds could be used only for qualified expenses such as payroll, certain debts, group healthcare payments and other business-related things. Then, after 24 weeks, the loans could be forgiven if the recipients could show that the proceeds were used as intended and that at least 60% of the funds was used for payroll.
But Howard and Myers, the indictment alleges, diverted the money for personal use or to cover the debts of other businesses they were involved with.
In April 2020, the indictment alleges, each wrote checks to themselves for $500,000 from the Zoie LLC account, noting in the memo that the money was for “payroll funds.” They then used the checks to obtain cashier’s checks for themselves from other banks.
Myers, it is alleged, used three cashier’s checks totaling $250,000 to place the money in his daughter’s checking account at Busey Bank in Champaign. He then wired the money to a Madison County title company to purchase a house in Worden in the name of his then-girlfriend, who he has since married, the indictment says.
Cashier’s checks totaling $50,000 also were deposited into a checking account at Busey Bank in Champaign that was held by Zade Trucking, a freight company also owned by Howard and Myers. The two made a series of withdrawals in the amount of $9,930, some of which were then redeposited into Howard’s personal bank account, the indictment alleges.
The partners also are accused of moving an additional $426,400 worth of loan funds from the Zoie LLC account to the Zade Trucking account and used to pay down that company’s debts.
The indictment outlines several other withdrawals and deposits involving the cashier’s checks obtained with the use of PPP loan funds.
Bankruptcy and falsified records
In June 2020, Myers filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the U.S. Court for the Southern District of Illinois in East St. Louis. On his petition, he falsely claimed he had $1,000 in cash and no real property despite still holding $200,000 in cashier’s checks and the house in Worden.
Myers later used a cashier’s check to make a $100,000 deposit into the bank account of AAA Rentals, a company owned by his wife, the indictment says.
Howard, a 2018 inductee to the College Football Hall of Fame, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in December 2020, despite still holding $350,000 in cashier’s checks.
The next month, on Jan. 27, 2021, Howard and Myers applied for forgiveness of the PPP loan, claiming the majority of the funds were used to pay their employees while the rest went to rent or lease payments, according to the indictment. They also checked “no” on the loan forgiveness application when it asked if they were involved in a bankruptcy, even though both had filed Chapter 11 in the months prior.
Sunnquist was indicted on allegations of falsifying and doctoring spreadsheets, invoices, rental agreements and other records to show PPP-eligible expenses that Zoie LLC never actually incurred.
In one example, the indictment says, Sunnquist claimed Zoie LLC made payments to Treloar Enterprises for the rental of heavy equipment at a time when the company was not operating because its owner was serving a federal prison sentence.
After Saint Louis Bank, which administered the PPP loan, raised concerns about Zoie LLC’s loan forgiveness application, Howard submitted a revised application with more claims of bogus expenses. The application was ultimately denied.
In the meantime, Howard and Myers had applied for a second PPP loan for $1.43 million, again asserting they had not filed bankruptcy, according to the indictment.
A pending motion by a federal prosecutor indicates the three men will be issued a summons to appear in court but that date has not yet been set.
In an unrelated case, Howard also faces a charge of aggravated battery of a police officer in Champaign County. The alleged incident occurred on the field at Memorial Stadium, after the Illinois football team defeated Michigan on Oct. 16.
Editor's note: This story was originally published by the Belleville News-Democrat. Carolyn P. Smith is a reporter for the Belleville News-Democrat, a news partner of St. Louis Public Radio.
