BATON ROUGE (AP) — The former owner of a now-defunct Baton Rouge debt-collection agency has been sentenced to 51 months in federal prison in a case that caused combined losses of more than $430,000 at two banks.

On Tuesday, Chief U.S. District Judge Brian Jackson also ordered 59-year-old William S. Ferguson II of LaPlace to pay $304,000 in restitution to Chase Bank and nearly $127,000 in restitution to Hancock Bank.

Jackson said Ferguson must report to the federal Bureau of Prisons by June 4.

The Advocate reports Ferguson, the former owner of Bush & Kennedy Inc., pleaded guilty Jan. 4 to three counts of bank fraud and one count of aggravated identity theft.

Jackson sentenced him to 27 months on the bank fraud charges and 24 months on the identity theft charge, with the terms to run consecutively.

Ferguson told Jackson he takes full responsibility for his criminal actions and he regrets those actions, which he said brought “shame” to himself and his family.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Richard Bourgeois said Ferguson’s criminal conduct occurred “over the better part of a year.”

“It’s not a one-time thing,” Bourgeois told the judge, adding that Ferguson and his former firm have been sued “all over the country.”

Jackson told Ferguson he engaged in “absolutely reprehensible conduct.”

“I do not understand how you thought you could get away with this in this day and age,” the judge said.

Ferguson’s scheme defrauded Chase and Hancock banks through the intentional deposit of bogus checks into Bush & Kennedy’s accounts, his plea agreement states. After the worthless checks were deposited into those accounts, Ferguson withdrew money he knew would not be covered by the checks, he admitted in the plea agreement.

A federal grand jury had indicted Ferguson on 61 counts of bank fraud and three counts of aggravated identity theft. The thefts alleged against him occurred in 2006.

At the request of the Louisiana Attorney General’s Office, state District Judge Mike Caldwell signed an order in December 2009 prohibiting Bush & Kennedy, Ferguson and the company’s chief financial officer from doing business. State prosecutors said then that the firm had been the subject of dozens of complaints from at least 30 states since 2001.