The former operations manager of Portland's Rivergate Federal Credit Union was sentenced to 18 months in federal prison on Monday for systematically embezzling $408,062.38 from the bank.
Jade Carnahan, appearing before U.S. District Judge Marco A. Hernandez, accepted responsibility for her crimes. She blamed her actions on a serious addiction to Vicodin, a painkiller composed of hydrocodone and acetaminophen.
The 35-year-old Scappoose resident faced up to 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine for bank larceny at the North Portland credit union. She pleaded guilty in April to stealing from its bank vault and customer accounts, including the funds of senior citizens.
Her embezzlement began in 2005 and ended in 2012, according to the U.S. attorney's office for Oregon.
Gregory A. Fowler, Oregon's top FBI official, said Carnahan was in a position of trust to guard the very money she stole.
"She broke that trust, using her access as a bank employee to feed a drug habit," Fowler said. "Addiction to prescription pain killers can be just as devastating as street drugs, such as crack and heroin."
Showing posts with label Oregon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Oregon. Show all posts
Saturday, September 28, 2013
Sunday, August 11, 2013
Ex-Bank of Oswego, Oregon exec fights fraud charges
A former Bank of Oswego executive is facing charges in both state and federal courts.
Geoffrey S. Walsh is fighting criminal charges of wire fraud, engaging in monetary transactions with criminally derived property and making false statements on a loan application. He was indicted July 16 in U.S. District Court on allegations that he defrauded an investor starting in May 2012, right after he lost his job as vice president of business development and lending services at The Bank of Oswego.
The offenses carry maximum penalties of 20 to 30 years in prison, according to court records.
According to the indictment, an investor identified as H.S. loaned Walsh $500,000 without knowing Walsh had been fired and without knowing the money would be used for personal expenses rather than business purposes. Walsh allegedly said he would use the money to invest in the purchase of two condominiums, which he put up as collateral, when he actually already owned the condos and was in the process of selling them. He reportedly still owes the investor $200,000 as well as interest and penalties on the loan.
The indictment also accuses Walsh of making false statements on a loan application for bank customers as early as 2007, when he worked at the Lake Oswego branch of Golf Savings Bank, now Sterling Savings Bank.
The Bank of Oswego, meanwhile, is suing Walsh in Clackamas County Circuit Court.
The bank has accused Walsh of misappropriating trade secrets and is seeking an estimated $600,000 in damages.
According to the civil suit filed July 24, Walsh in September 2010 recommended the bank extend a $1.7 million line of credit to a trust overseen by Martin Kehoe for business investment purposes and operating expenses of two companies. The complaint alleges Kehoe, more commonly known as a prominent area real estate developer, used the money to make loans to existing customers of the bank — borrowing which could overextend those customers and put the bank’s loans at risk of default — and contends Walsh received loans from Kehoe’s companies. The line of credit’s maturity date was extended twice, through 2012.
The lawsuit also alleges Walsh and another former executive, Diana Yates, who resigned her position as executive vice president and chief financial officer in March 2012, kept bank clients’ confidential information to use for later financial and professional gain.
Walsh was fired May 2, 2012, because of “unacceptable banking practices,” according to the complaint, which includes excerpts from bank emails uncovered after Walsh was fired.
In one email sent to Walsh in April 2012, Kehoe said some of the bank’s customers who borrowed money from Onboard Capital, one of his companies, were failing to make payments on the hard-money loans and pushed for Walsh to either take properties backing those loans and immediately sell them, to provide the customers with alternative financing or to “squeeze them to pay me off.”
Kehoe said in the April email he was still making monthly payments on the credit lines but had reached an “emergency point” with the situation.
He contends he never loaned Walsh any money and Walsh simply facilitated the loans.
“We never paid him a fee, nor did he borrow money from us,” Kehoe said.
He said bank executives were aware he would use the line of credit to make hard-money loans. In addition, he contends the bank’s president and chief executive officer, Dan Heine, asked him to alter a financial statement to recategorize the types of loans he’d received.
Eventually, Kehoe said, “We paid off our credit lines and severed our relationship to the bank.”
Heine said the bank has a policy to not comment on pending litigation.
An attorney representing Walsh did not respond to a call seeking comment.
Neither Kehoe nor Yates is a defendant in the civil suit. Kehoe said he plans to file his own lawsuit against the bank, likely within the next month.
Geoffrey S. Walsh is fighting criminal charges of wire fraud, engaging in monetary transactions with criminally derived property and making false statements on a loan application. He was indicted July 16 in U.S. District Court on allegations that he defrauded an investor starting in May 2012, right after he lost his job as vice president of business development and lending services at The Bank of Oswego.
The offenses carry maximum penalties of 20 to 30 years in prison, according to court records.
According to the indictment, an investor identified as H.S. loaned Walsh $500,000 without knowing Walsh had been fired and without knowing the money would be used for personal expenses rather than business purposes. Walsh allegedly said he would use the money to invest in the purchase of two condominiums, which he put up as collateral, when he actually already owned the condos and was in the process of selling them. He reportedly still owes the investor $200,000 as well as interest and penalties on the loan.
The indictment also accuses Walsh of making false statements on a loan application for bank customers as early as 2007, when he worked at the Lake Oswego branch of Golf Savings Bank, now Sterling Savings Bank.
The Bank of Oswego, meanwhile, is suing Walsh in Clackamas County Circuit Court.
The bank has accused Walsh of misappropriating trade secrets and is seeking an estimated $600,000 in damages.
According to the civil suit filed July 24, Walsh in September 2010 recommended the bank extend a $1.7 million line of credit to a trust overseen by Martin Kehoe for business investment purposes and operating expenses of two companies. The complaint alleges Kehoe, more commonly known as a prominent area real estate developer, used the money to make loans to existing customers of the bank — borrowing which could overextend those customers and put the bank’s loans at risk of default — and contends Walsh received loans from Kehoe’s companies. The line of credit’s maturity date was extended twice, through 2012.
The lawsuit also alleges Walsh and another former executive, Diana Yates, who resigned her position as executive vice president and chief financial officer in March 2012, kept bank clients’ confidential information to use for later financial and professional gain.
Walsh was fired May 2, 2012, because of “unacceptable banking practices,” according to the complaint, which includes excerpts from bank emails uncovered after Walsh was fired.
In one email sent to Walsh in April 2012, Kehoe said some of the bank’s customers who borrowed money from Onboard Capital, one of his companies, were failing to make payments on the hard-money loans and pushed for Walsh to either take properties backing those loans and immediately sell them, to provide the customers with alternative financing or to “squeeze them to pay me off.”
Kehoe said in the April email he was still making monthly payments on the credit lines but had reached an “emergency point” with the situation.
He contends he never loaned Walsh any money and Walsh simply facilitated the loans.
“We never paid him a fee, nor did he borrow money from us,” Kehoe said.
He said bank executives were aware he would use the line of credit to make hard-money loans. In addition, he contends the bank’s president and chief executive officer, Dan Heine, asked him to alter a financial statement to recategorize the types of loans he’d received.
Eventually, Kehoe said, “We paid off our credit lines and severed our relationship to the bank.”
Heine said the bank has a policy to not comment on pending litigation.
An attorney representing Walsh did not respond to a call seeking comment.
Neither Kehoe nor Yates is a defendant in the civil suit. Kehoe said he plans to file his own lawsuit against the bank, likely within the next month.
Thursday, November 4, 2010
FBI: Fugitive Oregon banker was 'heavy gambler'
Wells Fargo fired Saia for opening fraudulent accounts
Federal agents continue to search for a former Coos Bay Wells Fargo employee who is believed to have laundered money, stolen identities and committed credit card and bank fraud involving funds of some elderly customers.
Several suffer from cancer and other physical ailments.
FBI Special Agent Jason Cherry said federal agents think 37-year-old Shawna Saia, also known as Shawna Saia-Moore, may have fled to Las Vegas.
'She's a heavy gambler," Cherry said.
Saia may have also headed to be with family in Kona, Hawaii. According to her Facebook account, she lists her hometown as Hilo, Hawaii.
Federal investigators and Coos Bay police went to Saia's Coos Bay home Thursday to serve an arrest warrant and raid it for evidence of identity theft, aggravated identity theft, credit card fraud, wire fraud, bank fraud, laundering of monetary instruments and engaging in monetary transactions in property derived from specified unlawful activity.
Cherry said Saia was last seen dropping off her child at a local school at about 8 a.m. that day. She never returned to her 1384 Montana Ave. home.
We just missed her. ... I don't know if we passed her or a neighbor called her, but somehow she figured out about the search and turned off her phone," Cherry said.
At the house, agents found 50 or more prepaid gambling cards for casinos throughout Oregon and in Las Vegas, as well as 50 or more Louis Vuitton, Coach and other high-end purses.
Before she took her job with Wells Fargo, Saia worked as a rooms division manager at The Mill Casino-Hotel from March 2003 to July 2005, said Mill spokesman Ray Doering.
Cherry noted that she has no known criminal history.
Federal agents became interested in Saia when Wells Fargo personnel fired her in August for opening bank accounts for customers without their knowledge to obtain commissions, Cherry wrote in an arrest and search warrant affidavit. She had been hired at the Coos Bay branch, 200 N. Broadway, in August 2006 as a teller. She eventually rose to assistant manager.
Two of her regular customers later reviewed their accounts and discovered multiple unauthorized transactions had been made.
Saia may have taken as much as $1.2 million in funds and gold coins from account holders.
Victims include a man who took Saia on fishing trips, excavated her backyard, and eventually trusted her with his safe deposit box keys before undergoing cancer surgery.
After Saia was terminated, (he) checked his safe deposit box and discovered that approximately 10 gold coins ... were missing," the affidavit said.
The man later said Saia showed him firearms that included assault rifles.
Another victim with medical problems described Saia 'as a best friend" before learning her money was missing and her line of equity at the bank was about $120,000 over what should have been withdrawn.
Sean Hoar, an assistant U.S. Attorney for the District of Oregon, said there may be other victims.
Anyone caring for a family member who banks at Wells Fargo should consider checking that person's finances to ensure he or she has not been victimized, he said.
If there is evidence, they should contact Wells Fargo, then Cherry at 541-349-2359.
Saia is described as a 5-foot-6-inch woman, weighing 150 pounds, with brown hair and green eyes.
Shawna Leimomi Moore-Saia used to work for Wells Fargo but when the bank started to receive complaints from customers that their money was disappearing, she was sacked and reported to the authorities. She promptly absconded and has been in hiding since August. Now she has surrendered to face federal charges.
The FBI put the woman who has a number of aliases used to be a hostess in a casino in Oregan.
Her FBI wanted poster says she was wanted for her alleged involvement in the theft of a large amount of money from a bank in Coos Bay, Oregon. She allegedly embezzled the money from the bank by targeting vulnerable, elderly, and sick customers and their accounts while working as an employee of the bank from August of 2006 until August of 2010. Saia Moore, born in Hawaii, was charged with multiple counts of a variety of federal white collar crimes in the United States District Court, District of Oregon, Eugene, Oregon, on 27 October, 2010 and a warrant was issued for her arrest.
The charges include identity fraud, credit card fraud, embezzlement and money laundering plus the inevitable wire fraud
Federal agents continue to search for a former Coos Bay Wells Fargo employee who is believed to have laundered money, stolen identities and committed credit card and bank fraud involving funds of some elderly customers.
Several suffer from cancer and other physical ailments.
FBI Special Agent Jason Cherry said federal agents think 37-year-old Shawna Saia, also known as Shawna Saia-Moore, may have fled to Las Vegas.
'She's a heavy gambler," Cherry said.
Saia may have also headed to be with family in Kona, Hawaii. According to her Facebook account, she lists her hometown as Hilo, Hawaii.
Federal investigators and Coos Bay police went to Saia's Coos Bay home Thursday to serve an arrest warrant and raid it for evidence of identity theft, aggravated identity theft, credit card fraud, wire fraud, bank fraud, laundering of monetary instruments and engaging in monetary transactions in property derived from specified unlawful activity.
Cherry said Saia was last seen dropping off her child at a local school at about 8 a.m. that day. She never returned to her 1384 Montana Ave. home.
We just missed her. ... I don't know if we passed her or a neighbor called her, but somehow she figured out about the search and turned off her phone," Cherry said.
At the house, agents found 50 or more prepaid gambling cards for casinos throughout Oregon and in Las Vegas, as well as 50 or more Louis Vuitton, Coach and other high-end purses.
Before she took her job with Wells Fargo, Saia worked as a rooms division manager at The Mill Casino-Hotel from March 2003 to July 2005, said Mill spokesman Ray Doering.
Cherry noted that she has no known criminal history.
Federal agents became interested in Saia when Wells Fargo personnel fired her in August for opening bank accounts for customers without their knowledge to obtain commissions, Cherry wrote in an arrest and search warrant affidavit. She had been hired at the Coos Bay branch, 200 N. Broadway, in August 2006 as a teller. She eventually rose to assistant manager.
Two of her regular customers later reviewed their accounts and discovered multiple unauthorized transactions had been made.
Saia may have taken as much as $1.2 million in funds and gold coins from account holders.
Victims include a man who took Saia on fishing trips, excavated her backyard, and eventually trusted her with his safe deposit box keys before undergoing cancer surgery.
After Saia was terminated, (he) checked his safe deposit box and discovered that approximately 10 gold coins ... were missing," the affidavit said.
The man later said Saia showed him firearms that included assault rifles.
Another victim with medical problems described Saia 'as a best friend" before learning her money was missing and her line of equity at the bank was about $120,000 over what should have been withdrawn.
Sean Hoar, an assistant U.S. Attorney for the District of Oregon, said there may be other victims.
Anyone caring for a family member who banks at Wells Fargo should consider checking that person's finances to ensure he or she has not been victimized, he said.
If there is evidence, they should contact Wells Fargo, then Cherry at 541-349-2359.
Saia is described as a 5-foot-6-inch woman, weighing 150 pounds, with brown hair and green eyes.
Shawna Leimomi Moore-Saia used to work for Wells Fargo but when the bank started to receive complaints from customers that their money was disappearing, she was sacked and reported to the authorities. She promptly absconded and has been in hiding since August. Now she has surrendered to face federal charges.
The FBI put the woman who has a number of aliases used to be a hostess in a casino in Oregan.
Her FBI wanted poster says she was wanted for her alleged involvement in the theft of a large amount of money from a bank in Coos Bay, Oregon. She allegedly embezzled the money from the bank by targeting vulnerable, elderly, and sick customers and their accounts while working as an employee of the bank from August of 2006 until August of 2010. Saia Moore, born in Hawaii, was charged with multiple counts of a variety of federal white collar crimes in the United States District Court, District of Oregon, Eugene, Oregon, on 27 October, 2010 and a warrant was issued for her arrest.
The charges include identity fraud, credit card fraud, embezzlement and money laundering plus the inevitable wire fraud
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
Oregon woman charged with embezzling money from bank
The former marketing director for Rock River Bank has been charged with embezzling nearly $33,000 from the bank over a three-year span.A federal grand jury returned an indictment on Lynn A. Wilsie, 37, of Oregon, charging her with 12 counts of embezzling $32,904.98 from the bank from July 2006 to June 2009.
Wilsie, according to the indictment, was responsible for handling invoices related to advertising and public relations. The indictment states that Wilsie prepared accounts-payable tickets for payments to the bank’s vendors but used those tickets to issue cashier’s checks payable to others.Wilsie is then alleged to have used those checks to pay for her own personal expenses, including her rent, credit card purchases and the repayment of a personal loan.Wilsie had been an employee at Rock River Bank since 1995.
State banking regulators closed the bank’s four branches — three in Oregon and one in Rockford — July 2.
If convicted, Wilsie could face up to 30 years in prison. She is set to appear in federal court in Rockford at 10:30 a.m. Tuesday in front of Judge P. Michael Mahoney.
Lynn Wilsie appeared in Federal Court on September 9, 2010 and when she returns at the end of the month, she's expected to change her plea from not guilty to guilty. Wilsie used to be Vice President and Marketing Director for the old Rock River Bank. She's accused of preparing cashiers checks and then taking the money for her own use. If convicted, she faces up to 30 years in prison and a one-million dollar fine for each of her 12 counts.
Wilsie, according to the indictment, was responsible for handling invoices related to advertising and public relations. The indictment states that Wilsie prepared accounts-payable tickets for payments to the bank’s vendors but used those tickets to issue cashier’s checks payable to others.Wilsie is then alleged to have used those checks to pay for her own personal expenses, including her rent, credit card purchases and the repayment of a personal loan.Wilsie had been an employee at Rock River Bank since 1995.
State banking regulators closed the bank’s four branches — three in Oregon and one in Rockford — July 2.
If convicted, Wilsie could face up to 30 years in prison. She is set to appear in federal court in Rockford at 10:30 a.m. Tuesday in front of Judge P. Michael Mahoney.
Lynn Wilsie appeared in Federal Court on September 9, 2010 and when she returns at the end of the month, she's expected to change her plea from not guilty to guilty. Wilsie used to be Vice President and Marketing Director for the old Rock River Bank. She's accused of preparing cashiers checks and then taking the money for her own use. If convicted, she faces up to 30 years in prison and a one-million dollar fine for each of her 12 counts.
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