Former couple sentenced in $800,000 fraud tied to Sanger golf club owner

A Fresno County judge sentenced Justin Teel and Gina Abercrombie on Tuesday for a fraud that prosecutors said drained more than $800,000 from the late Randy Hansen, the Sanger golf club owner behind Sherwood Forest Golf Club. Teel was ordered into custody for three years, while Abercrombie received one year in jail and five years of probation.

The case centered on Hansen, whose name is still tied to one of Sanger’s best-known local landmarks. Sherwood Forest Golf Club, Inc. was incorporated in 1970, and the club says its 18 holes along the Kings River have been open since 1968. The club also says it was hand-built by former PGA pro Carol Hansen and his wife, Jane, a family legacy that prosecutors said the pair exploited after Hansen became vulnerable following the death of his wife.

Court records and local reporting showed the fraud stretched across years. Prosecutors said Abercrombie and Teel used Hansen’s identity and financial information to obtain money and loans, including more than $700,000 in fraudulent business loans between Feb. 9, 2017, and Jan. 31, 2022. Randy Hansen died on March 24, 2020, at age 75, after being born April 10, 1945, in Buffalo, New York. His obituary said he took pride in helping develop Sherwood Forest with his parents more than 50 years ago.

The case did not move quickly. Abercrombie and Teel were arrested in Pleasanton on Feb. 22, 2023, then stood trial beginning Feb. 23, 2026. A jury convicted both defendants on May 20 after more than two months of testimony and thousands of documents. That long record made the sentencing a milestone in a case that has shadowed one of Fresno County’s more recognizable family businesses.

Abercrombie will remain on probation for five years after her jail term. Teel will have no probation tail. The sentence also leaves Hansen’s family with a criminal case closed in court but not necessarily in consequence, because the theft targeted a local estate tied to Sherwood Forest’s ownership and operations.

Local reports identified Stacy Hansen Dovali as Randy Hansen’s daughter and the current owner of Sherwood Forest Golf Club. Another family member, Beverly Rutherford, was also reported as facing charges in the wider estate case, underscoring how far the investigation extended beyond the former couple and into the family network around the club.

The sentencing ended one chapter in a fraud that combined elder financial abuse, identity theft and a long-running loan scheme tied to a prominent Sanger name. For Fresno County, it also closed a case built around a business that has been part of the Kings River landscape for nearly six decades.