It’s an uncomfortable situation when your employees steal from you. Or, worse, when they use your database platform to steal from your clients.
I have written about employee theft, with one article entitled, Employ Theft Among Valued Employees. Clearly, since the Recession employee theft has been on the increase. Some thieving employees may have criminal convictions but who slipped through the background checks that were conducted during the employment screening process. And some may just be employees who fell into dire straits, got in over their heads, and now steal to make ends meet. Large corporations and smaller companies have all been subjected to employment theft.
Now a former Texas Bank Manager pleaded guilty to robbing his customers of some $2 Million. A tidy sum. Not exactly pencils and a few reams of paper. The convicted employee used the money to live it large. No desperation here. Just aspirations for a better lifestyle, one way above her pay grade.
According to the article in the Ft.Worth Star-Telegram…”she used the money for vacations, clothing, jewelry and land. She must forfeit property in Granbury, a car, a camping trailer, plus a diamond ring and bracelet.”
She operated in what I would call a modified Ponzi Scheme. She robbed from one customer’s account and when the customer complained of missing funds, she would replace it with money stolen from a different customer account. How she didn’t expect to be discovered is beyond me. Maybe she did, and the thrill and the goodies, those trinkets and baubles were worth the risk. Hard to say.
She faces up to thirty years in prison with restitution of approximately $1 Million. The prison sentence should give her plenty of time to ponder whether it was worth it.
