Deer Park Contractor Sentenced To 7 Years Judge Rejects Plea Bargain For 18 Felony Theft Convictions

He used their money to feed his cocaine habit. He gambled with it, too, chartering a first-class junket to Las Vegas.

Samuel Ernest Cover Jr. did a lot of things with their money.

What he didn’t do was build.

While grinding his debt-plagued business into the dust, the Deer Park contractor left an angry trail of victims scattered around Spokane County.

Eighteen customers ordered steel-shelled garages and storage buildings from Cover that never materialized.

They thought they were getting a bargain. Instead, they got taken - for a combined $94,000.

“He stole more from me than just money. He destroyed my faith in human beings,” said Elmer DiLuzio, a Colbert retiree.

That’s why DiLuzio and other victims fumed Friday over a plea bargain hammered out in the case. It called for little, if any, time behind bars for Cover despite convictions on 18 felony theft counts.

“That’s not justice,” DiLuzio complained.

Superior Court Judge Thomas Merryman agreed. He said the deal cut by lawyers was so lenient it would “invite disrespect for the law.

“Frankly, I find it totally unacceptable,” he said.

Merryman then went beyond sentencing guidelines to impose a seven-year prison term and require full restitution - turning scowls into smiles in the courtroom gallery.

Defense attorney Tim Trageser portrayed Cover as a small-business man who got in way over his head, low-bidding jobs in his desire to sign up as many customers as possible.

Formed in the winter of 1992, S&B Contractors started out strong, advertising in the Nickel Nik Want Ads. Within a few months, Cover was bringing in $20,000 a month, authorities said.

But by the following spring, it began to unravel.

His drug and alcohol habits were costly, his marriage was on the skids, and he was having problems with subcontractors and employees stealing money and doing shoddy work, he said.

In May 1993, he admitted blowing more than $60,000 on a Las Vegas junket, including a chartered jet.

Instead of slowing down and retrenching, Cover kept taking money from customers to cover his mounting debts to suppliers.

As a result, many promised garages and storage sheds were never built.

Cover’s customers had no idea their contractor was an ex-convict, who spent time in the Washington State Penitentiary on assault convictions.

After being charged in February 1994 with 11 theft counts, he posted bail and formed a new construction company.

He then proceeded to sell more buildings - racking up more victims.

Cover hit rock bottom a short time later when he robbed banks in Las Vegas and Southern California to pay off drug and gambling debts.

He was arrested and convicted of both robberies. In July 1994, he began serving a four-year federal prison sentence.

On Friday, Trageser and Deputy Prosecutor Mary Doran recommended a 57-month prison term for the thefts to run concurrently with the federal sentence. With time off for good behavior, Cover wouldn’t serve any additional time.There also was the thought that Cover could get out of prison in a few years and begin paying back the money he owes.

But Judge Merryman refused to accept the plea bargain, calling it “no sentence at all.”

He ordered the seven-year prison sentence to start running after Cover’s federal sentence is served.

Cover’s wife, Shannon, 27, also was charged in connection with the thefts. Those charges will be dismissed, Doran said.

, DataTimes