Ohio businessman responsible for $59M in losses to Indiana County bank gets 3½ years federal prison

An Ohio businessman who wrote more than $118 million in bad checks over four days to try to cover payroll and expenses was sentenced Thursday to serve 42 months in federal prison.

Harold Sosna, 68, of Cincinnati, also was ordered by U.S. District Judge Marilyn J. Horan in Pittsburgh to serve three years of supervised released after he gets out of prison. Sosna pleaded guilty last year to bank fraud.

According to the U.S. Attorney’s office, Sosna previously served as the president of Premier Healthcare Management Company, which operated nine nursing care facilities in southern and central Ohio, providing in-facility, post-acute and long-term care, as well as assisted living services through other corporate entities.

The investigation showed that Sosna wrote 203 checks with a combined value of more than $118 million between May 15 and May 18, 2020. The checks, prosecutors said, were written to manipulate the numerical balance in various bank accounts to create the false appearance that he had sufficient funds available to honor checks drawn on those accounts.

S&T Bank, headquartered in Indiana, Pa., suffered a loss of $59.2 million because of the scheme.

In a written statement filed in the case, Sosna said he was submitting it “heartbroken and humiliated.”

“I committed this bank fraud in a moment of financial desperation,” he wrote. “I knew at the time that my actions were illegal and wrong.”

Sosna said he did it to allow payroll and other business checks that otherwise would have bounced to clear. He wrote that the financial “dominoes” began to fall in 2017 when a building he owned, but was operated by someone else, was shut down.

It caused him to default on his loan, he said.

Following additional projects — including the construction of a dine-in movie theater, he wrote, “My well thought-out plan for systematic growth was replaced with chaos. After decades of success, I was bleeding money.”

He called the covid-19 pandemic the last straw.

“I did everything I could to stay afloat. I put all my savings and my wife’s savings into the business. I desperately tried and repeatedly failed to secure a working capital loan,” he wrote. “I made repeated efforts to restructure Premier’s financing with various traditional lending institutions but was unable to secure refinancing on terms favorable enough to restore the fiscal stability of the business.”

Sosna wrote in his statement that he ultimately began to rely on “the commercial equivalents of ‘pay-day lenders,’ also known as loan sharks.”

He borrowed millions of dollars from approximately 40 lenders, charging more than 500% interest. Sosna said they threatened his family with physical harm when he couldn’t pay.

”I pushed ahead knowing that I had about 1,000 residents and 1,000 employees, now literally risking their lives with the covid-19 outbreak, who depended on me daily. In addition, five of my own children’s livelihoods were tied to my businesses.”

Sosna said that his mental health suffered significantly from the weight of his crimes hanging on him, and since he went to prosecutors to cooperate, he has started to recover.

“I always viewed myself as an honorable man, who lived a life dedicated to my residents, employees, community and especially my family,” he said. “I believe I had a good reputation. I contributed to many charities. I sponsored university scholarships. After a long and satisfying career, I made a terrible mistake when I violated the law. I will spend the rest of my life striving to become worthy of forgiveness, but I know that I will never get over the shame.”