Back by popular demand, today’s blog entry spotlights recent fraud related news coverage from across the U.S.  I’ve selected a Top 5.  Prepare to be astounded!

#1 comes to us from the Eugene, Oregon area where a woman is accused in a lawsuit of embezzling well over $1 million from her longtime employer.  Sure the dollar value of this fraud catches your eye, however, the point I found particularly interesting was that the company anticipates being required to pay back taxes and penalties to the IRS as a consequence of the embezzlement.  Wow!  First they lose the money to the bookkeeper, and now they pay taxes on the understated revenue which they will never get back.

#2 is from the State of NY where a former bookkeeper pleaded not guilty to a 15- count indictment accusing her of stealing more than $3,000.  I liked the go-for-the-throat attitude of the owners in this story.  I’m sure the alleged would love to get a cash advance on her Visa and make this all go away.

The setting from #3 is New Jersey where a bookkeeper who stole $400,000 from her employer has been sentenced to six years in state prison.  In this case, the bookkeeper was ordered to pay a full restitution.  Not only is that uncommon, but it’s also alot of license plates.

#4 takes us back to NY where a former law office bookkeeper shed tears as she learned her fate for pocketing more than a half-million dollars from employers who trusted her.  The shocker for this story is the plural form of “employer”.  That’s right, she stole money from TWO different firms.

For the last in our Top 5, we head back to the West coast.  A former employee at Superior Tire Service was sentenced Tuesday to more than nine years in prison for embezzling more than $700,000 from the company during the course of 10 years.  As a CPA, I like how they bottom line the loss in this story explaining that “Superior Tire Service’s more than 145 employees lost benefits and pay raises because of the theft… her greed cost about $8,000 per employee”.

If you have stories to share, send them to truestories@auditmybooks.com.  If we publish them, we’ll give you full credit and a link back to your site.

-CP Morey