BARRE – He was called a “conman” and “fraudster” by those he ripped off before a judge termed Ryan Kimball’s repeated home improvement fraud actions “brazen” and sentenced him to a year and a half in prison.
Kimball, 34, of St. Johnsbury, left the Washington County criminal court in Barre in shackles as he headed off to jail following a sentencing hearing that stretched through Friday afternoon and ended after the sun had set.
“My satisfaction comes from watching him walk out in handcuffs just now,” Tina Desmarais of East Montpelier said after the hearing.
Desmarais lost the most money among Kimball’s victims who spoke in court Friday.
She said she had attended court hearing after court hearing in recent months as the cases against Kimball grew and progressed only to see him walk out the front door of the courthouse as a free man rather than out the back in custody.
“Finally,” Desmarais said following the hearing, “he’s going to jail.”
Desmarais now awaits payment of the nearly $11,000 deposit she lost when contracting with Kimball for a roof job at her home that never got done.
Moments earlier in the courtroom, Judge Mary Morrissey sentenced Kimball to 18 months behind bars and ordered him to pay restitution to five of his victims totaling almost $25,000.
As part of the sentence, the judge said, Kimball will remain on probation until the restitution is paid in full.
Desmarais, speaking later outside the courtroom, said didn’t expect to see her restitution any time soon, or possibly even ever, with the judge saying during the hearing that Kimball was already tens of thousands of dollars in debt.
“I’m sorry that it happened, it should have never happened,” Kimball said in the court when he got his chance to address the judge.
“I need to put it behind me and move on,” he added, “and be a better person for my children.”
Kimball last fall pleaded guilty to two felony home improvement charges and a misdemeanor offense of violating a condition of his release for accepting thousands of dollars for work he didn’t carry out.
Under the plea agreement, Washington County Deputy State’s Attorney Malachi Brennan was able to argue Friday for a two-year jail sentence while James LaMonda, Kimball’s attorney, could seek a lesser sentence.
Other charges, including other misdemeanor counts of home improvement fraud and additional violations of conditions of release offenses, were dismissed as part of the plea agreement.
In addition to the cases in Washington County, Kimball faces other charges of home improvement fraud in Caledonia and Essex counties. The charges in those other counties were not part of the plea deal in Washington County.
Brennan, the prosecutor, asked the judge on Friday to impose that maximum two-year prison term allowed under the plea agreement. He said while home improvement fraud cases seldom lead to jail sentences the ones involving Kimball stood out.
That’s because, the prosecutor said, it was apparent that when Kimball was signing contracts with people to do repair work, he actually never had the intent to carry out.
Instead, Brennan said, Kimball took the deposits, which were often a large percentage of a project’s cost, and was hardly seen or heard from again.
LaMonda disputed that his client’s intent was fraud. The defense lawyer called on the judge to impose a lesser jail sentence than the prosecutor had recommended, but not one that spared his client jail time.
LaMonda said Kimball understood that jail time was warranted in the case, and asked for a sentence of a year behind bars.
Several of the victims who spoke in court Friday told a similar story. They said they posted ads online seeking home repair work, from house painting to roof repairs, and got replies from Kimball.
After signing contracts and paying large amounts of the cost upfront, the victims who spoke Friday said, Kimball would show up, sometimes with others with him, and do the demolition work, and then never appear again.
The victims said that left in difficult positions.
For example Desmarais said she was preparing to sell her home for half a million dollars so she could move back to her home state of Maine when she contracted with Kimball to do the roof work.
Instead, she said, he sent some subcontractors to remove shingles and she was left with her home exposed to the elements for several months, and Kimball never did the remaining repair work.
And, victim after victim said Friday, he never returned their money, either.
Many of the victims addressed Kimball directly, calling him by his first name, Ryan. He appeared to be looking directly at them as they spoke.
“Ryan,” said John Turner, “it could have been different.”
Turner said he contracted with Kimball for a siding job at his Montpelier home. After paying a deposit, Kimball showed up and stripped some of the siding, Turner said, but never came back.
Turner said he hoped Kimball would change his ways in the future.
“Sometimes, prison is the best thing,” Turner told Kimball. “I think you probably should do some jail time, and I wish you well.”
Desmarais said she fell for a “sob story” Kimball told her and she agreed to contract with him for the roofing work at her home. “I was going to give this young man a break,” she said.
But, Desmarais said, she soon realized that trust had been misplaced.
“His behavior has turned my life upside down,” Desmariais told the judge, adding that she still hasn’t been able to sell her home.
Morrissey in handing down the 18-month prison term cited Kimball’s past record that included several convictions for other crimes of deceit such as passing bad checks and fraudulent use of a credit card.
The judge said the more recent home improvement fraud cases against Kimball are not “dissimilar” from his earlier convictions.
“From the court’s perspective, this is a long issue,” Morrissey said, calling his most recent actions “brazen” and a “breach of trust.”
Morrissey spoke of how Kimball had told police dating back to an investigation from the fall of 2017 that he knew he could not work for himself and manage home improvement projects.
“He acknowledged that,” the judge said. “Every contract he entered into after that, from the court’s perspective, he was asking the community to bear the risk of his noncompliance with the contract.”
Morrissey added, “He knew he was a risk, he told the police he was a risk in October 2017, and he continued to enter into new contracts anyway and the community bore the risk of that.”
The judge did say that Kimball’s situation is different than many defendants who come before her in such cases in that there is no indication that he suffered from a drug addiction or had been experiencing mental health problems.
“I do wish you well,” Morrissey told Kimball after delivering the sentence.
“Do your time in jail,” she added, “and reflect on how you spent the last several years and reflect on how you want to next ones.”
