Va. Mouse-In-Soup Scam Draws 1-Year Term

A man convicted of trying to extort half a million dollars from a Cracker Barrel restaurant by claiming his mother found a mouse in her soup was sentenced Thursday to one year in jail.

Ricky Lee Patterson, 23, of Hampton, also was ordered to pay a $2,500 fine.

A jury found Patterson guilty in April of one count of conspiracy to commit extortion. His mother, Carla Patterson, was convicted on the same charge and was sentenced to a year in jail and a $2,500 fine in July.

The Pattersons tried to extort $500,000 from Cracker Barrel in 2004 when they claimed they found a mouse in soup that Carla Patterson had ordered at the Newport News restaurant on Mother's Day.

Charges were filed after a necropsy showed the mouse had no soup in its lungs and had not been cooked.