UNITED STATES OF AMERICA v. CHARISE SHANELL STONE
US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, Agee, Aug. 2, 2017,
Recusal- A trial judge is not generally required to recuse herself from a criminal case in which she holds an insignificant amount of stock in a large victim company that would be minimally (if at all) affected by a restitution order

Facts:
Stone convinced homeowners (some of whom weren’t even behind in their mortgage payments) that they needed her services to make a short sale of their mortgages.
Stone “initially transferred ownership in the properties to herself, her husband, or one of her controlled entities and reported the sales to the mortgage companies, concealing these fraudulent transactions from both the homeowners and mortgage holders. Stone then quickly resold the properties, or “flipped” them, to predetermined buyers for more than the amounts she paid to the mortgage companies from the original short sales, again concealing these actions from the homeowners, buyers, and lenders. Stone also collected commissions and other fees on the sales as the real estate agent, although she was not licensed to sell real estate.”
Prior to trial, Stone requested that the judge recuse himself because she believed he owned stock in the banks that she defrauded. The judge found that recusal was not necessary.
A pre-sentence investigation report determined that Stone owed the lender banks $2,330,722. This was incorporated into the sentence as restitution owed.
Stone appealed, arguing that the restitution amount didn’t take into account the reduced value of the homes due to the short-sale. Stone also claimed that the trial judge should have recused himself.

Held:
The Fourth Circuit disagreed. Stone failed to object to the restitution at sentencing and failed to introduce sufficient evidence to call the numbers into question. Moreover, there was no evidence that her short-term short-sale provided the banks with the fair-market value of the homes.