Two former executives of the failed GulfSouth Private Bank in Destin, Fla., and another man have been indicted on federal charges of defrauding the Troubled Asset Relief Program of $7.5 million, National Mortgage News reported yesterday. Anthony J. Atkins, the bank's former president, and Samuel D. Cobb, a former vice president, and Bruce A. Houle, a customer from Inlet Beach, Fla., were hit with a seven-count indictment by a U.S. grand jury last week. The charges include conspiracy to commit bank fraud, false statements to a federally insured institution and bank and mail fraud, according to a news release from the Office of the Special Inspector General for TARP. Atkins and Cobb schemed in 2008 to conceal that the bank had mortgage loans in default, the inspector general's news release said. The executives are accused of having Houle and three others — Mark W. Shoemaker, Michael Bradley Bowen and William Blake Cody — take out $3.8 million of loans that the men were told they would not have to repay. A trial is scheduled for Feb. 6.
