A former University graduate student and University Symphony Orchestra member was sentenced to 37 months in prison on fraud charges by a U.S. District Court in San Francisco last week.
Joseph Hokai Tang, 29, pled guilty to two counts of wire fraud and eight counts of mail fraud, according to Valerie Kyono, the San Francisco U.S. District Court Criminal Case System administrator. Tang intentionally created a scheme in which he misrepresented the ownership, quality and authenticity of violins, violas and bows that he was selling, according to the court indictment.
Tang was ordered to pay more than $430,000 in restitution, Kyono said.
According to the indictment, Tang presented himself as a dealer and consignee of the instruments. After selling them he consistently failed to repay or claimed to have refunded the owners or sent the buyers different instruments than they had agreed upon.
Eugene Police Department officers arrested Tang, who was the concertmaster of the symphony, in November 2007 on behalf of the United States Postal Inspection Service directly following one of his symphony concerts in Beall Hall, much to the surprise of his fellow musicians.
According to the indictment, the scheme occurred between April 2002 and December 2006, and stretched as far as Rhede, Germany.
[email protected]