A Two Thousand Dollar Nebraska Land Purchase Leads to a Federal Fraud Case
It is just raw Nebraska prairie, the kind of earth farmers dream about.
I lowered the three-bottom plow into the soil, feeling the tractor frame drop as the steel shears bit into the sod. I shifted into third gear and let out the clutch, the diesel engine working harder as the dark, rich soil began to roll over in long, perfect ribbons behind me.
At six in the evening, I sat on my porch with a heavy ceramic mug of black coffee, watching the sunset turn the prairie grass to gold. The air was clean and cold, carrying only the scent of damp earth and dry grass.
The federal court in Lincoln sentenced Brinley and Chadwick Fairmont to six years in prison and ordered full restitution to the landowners. Arthur Graham chose not to attend the sentencing hearing, preferring to spend that Tuesday preparing his soil for the spring wheat. The neighborhood association was legally dissolved by the state attorney general, and Mr. Duca received his eight thousand dollars back from the escrow account. Arthur refused to file a private civil suit for damages, letting the matter rest with the federal authorities. He stood by his fence line as the evening light softened the rolling hills of his two hundred acres. The land belongs to the people who actually work the soil.
The sight of the dark, rich soil turning over behind my plow, ready for the first seed.
