BATON ROUGE - East Baton Rouge Sheriff’s Office detectives arrested a man for contractor fraud after he was accused of stealing more than $20,000 from a Baton Rouge couple.

53-year-old Edmund Leblanc was booked into the parish prison on charges of forgery, theft and injuring public records following his arrest Friday.

EBRSO said they were contacted by the victims who reported they originally contacted Leblanc in order to have the man add a studio onto their house. They said they initially wrote a check, made out to Leblanc, for $3,500 for a consultation fee.

Leblanc next requested a check for $20,000 to cover the cost of the work, according to investigators. He also came by the victims residence on Mar. 31 to pick up a check for $2,750 that Leblanc claimed was to pay the electrician. This check was also made out to Leblanc, according to deputies.

When the work was not completed as requested, the victims contacted the business by which Leblanc was supposedly employed. The arrest report indicates that the business had fired and was pursuing criminal charges against Leblanc since June for internal theft. Further investigation by authorities revealed that Leblanc had forged other documents in the names of the victims.

Deputies made contact with Leblanc in August 2015, requesting that he come by for an interview in order to tell his side of the story. Deputies said Leblanc agreed to meet on several dates but failed to show up each time. In September, he said he would show up with an attorney to “show he did nothing wrong,” but again he did not appear.