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Tom J. Billman stole millions from depositors of his failed savings and loan, abandoned his wife and kids, and fled the country to live a life of luxury--sailboats, yachts, Mediterranean villas and sultry mistresses.
But to his friends and family, he's still a good citizen, a good human being, a devoted family nan and a law-abiding individual.
At least that is the picture they paint of Billman in a series of letters to U.S. District Court Judge J. Frederick Motz.
When Billman is sentenced on Tuesday (June 21), prosecutors will ask Motz to put the convicted financier away for 40 years on mail and wire fraud convictions and make him pay back more than $28 million siphoned from Community Savings & Loan Association, the failed Bethesda thrift he once owned.
Billman's lawyers, however, are suggesting a two-year prison term, while his friends and colleagues are pushing for community service.
To that end, Billman's supporters have written 28 letters in an effort to influence Motz's deliberations before he decides on a sentence.
Prosecutors have also obtained handwritten letters that Billman allegedly penned from his jail cell. Addressed to Billman's alleged courier, they contain detailed instructions on how to conceal his stolen millions.
In one of those letters, Billman makes casual references to a brief stop in a cushy federal pen on his way to a life of leisure and riches--arguably contradicting both his claims of poverty and of contrition.
Taken together, the letters provide remarkable insight into a man that many now know as Maryland's last savings and loan desperado.
Will the real Tom Billman please stand up?
LIVING LARGE
Billman, 53, disappeared in 1988 after he and his business partners were ordered to pay $12 million in a Montgomery County civil judgment stemming from Community's collapse.
The failure of the thrift has cost Maryland taxpayers $80 million. Billman was later indicted on charges of diverting $06 million from the savings and loan in an effort to hold his failing real estate companies together. Of that, he siphoned off at least $28 million for personal use.
Using fake names and passports, he skipped around the globe. He dressed in custom-tailored suits, sailed the Mediterranean aboard his two yachts, bought precious gems and occasionally wired money...