By DOUGLAS W. MOTLEY
Senior Writer
An Inland Empire man who had been acting as church pastor and is accused of stealing more than $230,000 through wire fraud schemes and confidence violations was arrested on Thursday, March 6.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California stated in a March 7 news release that Terrance Owens Elliott aka “Tony Elliott,” 60, of Crestline was arrested on an 11-count federal grand jury incitement alleging that he targeted several longtime friends and a nonprofit corporation tied to another church and swindled them out of more than $230,000.
Elliot, who is a pastor at an unidentified San Bernardino church, named in the inditement as Church A, is a former candidate for the San Bernardino City Council. He is being tried in court with the accusations that he committed several con jobs upon numerous victims, including theft, deceptions and Ponzi-style schemes that resulted in his personal benefit and their loss of assets.
The indictment states that Elliott, who was a trusted pastor at a church, told those friends he had victimized that he worked for a San Bernardino government agency and that he was involved with the San Bernardino Police Department, both of which are untrue, according to a previous grand jury inditement rendered on Feb. 26. However, he was able to convince several longtime friends that he was trustworthy and defrauded them out of approximately $150,263 by convincing his first victim, a friend identified in the inditement as “M.C.,” to put her inheritance money into a trust for her own benefit.
According to prosecutors in the case, Elliott convinced her that, if she received the inheritance directly and spent any of the money on herself, she would lose her Medicare and Social Security benefits that she had been using for her daily living expenses. Then he suggested, as a pastor and a friend, that he would manage and administer the trust funds for her.
Court documents support the facts that Elliott prepared a trust agreement and appointed himself as a co-trustee, which he convinced her was appropriate. However, when he opened the bank account in the trust’s name, he produced a phony copy of the agreement for the bank, saying that he would be the only trustee with the authority to sign checks and make payments from the account. Then Elliott proceeded to write checks and make online transfers to his church and used the funds to buy postal money orders to pay the church’s rent. He allegedly used more of her money for his personal expenses, including the repair of a Chevrolet truck, Nike sneakers, a piano and an extended warranty for a motorcycle.
Elliott also obtained access to M.C.’s account at a different bank and made $27,164 in unauthorized transfers of some of her monthly Social Security payments. When M.C.’s family members began asking about the trust account and for bank statements about her finances, he assured them all was well and not to worry. They reportedly felt a sense of satisfaction at the time and he kept them in the dark and refrained them from doing additional research.
When M.C. died, he allegedly tricked another victim, identified as “W.H.,” to pay $8,615 for her funeral expenses, falsely claiming he needed authorization from a judge before money in the trust account could be released. Through this scheme, he defrauded four victims, including M.C. and M.H., out of $150,263.
In a separate scheme, from June 2021 to February 2023, Elliott advised victim W.H. on selling a house when renters occupied the property. After W.H. sold the house, Elliott called him and suggested the victim’s corporation loan M.C.’s trust $65,000, falsely claiming this would help the victim to avoid having to pay a capital gains tax from the house’s sale. He then prepared a loan contract between a corporation W.H. had set up and M.C.’s trust, which they signed. Elliott told W.H. that Elliott would transfer $65,000 from the corporation to the trust account and that the trust would repay the loan with 10 percent annual interest. Elliott convinced the victim to give him several signed blank checks from the bank account of W.H.’s corporation.
Instead of honoring the contract, Elliott used one of the blank checks to make an unauthorized transfer of funds, without W.H.’s knowledge or consent. Although Elliott ultimately transferred $49,000 to the trust, he never repaid any part of the $65,000 loan. Instead, he spent the bulk of the money on his own personal expenses.
Finally, from September 2018 to June 2021, Elliott used his relationships with Church A and its board of directors to help manage the church’s litigation expenses and other costs involving a different church – identified in the indictment as “Church B” – and a nonprofit. Elliott reportedly lied to the nonprofit and Church B’s board of directors that the nonprofit owed money to W.H.’s corporation for services rendered related to litigation against them. He caused the nonprofit to issue approximately 32 checks to W.H.’s corporation, which Elliott later deposited in a corporation-related bank account that he controlled. Elliott did not use the money from the checks for the nonprofit’s benefit and defrauded it out of approximately $23,300 In total, Elliott allegedly caused his victims approximately $238,563 in losses.
Assistant United States Attorney Benjamin J. Weir of the Riverside Branch Office is prosecuting this case. If convicted, Elliott would face a statutory maximum sentence of 20 years in federal prison for each count. The FBI is investigating this matter.
Based on evidence, investigators believe it is possible that Elliott has additional victims yet to be identified. Anyone with information is asked to contact the FBI at (310) 477-6565 or tips.fbi.gov.
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