Allen brewery owner convicted in fraud case linked to murder
Keith Ashley
McKINNEY, Texas - A Collin County man was found guilty in a fraud scheme liked to a murder case.
Keith Ashley faces life in prison after being convicted on federal fraud and gun charges.
Prosecutors said the 50-year-old used his work as a financial advisor and life insurance agent to steal money from clients.
He used that money to fund his lavish lifestyle and to pay for his struggling brewery in Allen – Nine Band Brewing.
Allen brewery owner accused of staging client's murder to look like a suicide
Jim Seegan
Prosecutors also accused Ashley of killing one of his clients, Jim Seegan, in Carrollton in 2020. They said he tried to make it look like a suicide so he could collect from Seegan’s life insurance policies.
"Ashley went to great lengths to defraud clients that trusted him," said U.S. Attorney Brit Featherston. "By plotting and causing the death of one client to steal his money, Ashley committed the ultimate betrayal of trust and decency and the jury saw Ashley for who he is, a con-artist who would go so far as murder to get what he wanted. Incredible work by investigators and prosecutors, as well as coordination between the Feds and the State have succeeded in getting this depraved criminal off the street."
Ashley is still awaiting trial for the capital murder charge.
His sentencing hearing for the fraud charges has not yet been scheduled.