Topsham Woman Sentenced to Almost Three Years for Stealing Money from Credit Union

PORTLAND, ME—United States Attorney Thomas E. Delahanty II announced today that Marsha Richard, 42, of Topsham, Maine, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge D. Brock Hornby in U.S. District Court in Portland to 33 months’ imprisonment for theft by a credit union employee. In addition, Judge Hornby sentenced Richard to serve a five-year term of supervised release and to pay restitution in an amount to be determined in a future proceeding. Richard pleaded guilty to the charge on September 23, 2011.

According to court records, from about November of 2004 to October of 2010, Richard, who was an employee of Atlantic Regional Federal Credit Union in Brunswick, engaged in a scheme to steal credit union funds. Richard manipulated accounting entries for checks that credit union members had deposited but that had been returned for insufficient funds. Instead of crediting the appropriate internal account, Richard credited accounts of family members or friends, or other accounts to which she had access. She then accessed the funds that she had wrongfully diverted for her own use. Richard stole over $500,000 of Atlantic Regional funds through her scheme. The credit union, not the individual members whose checks had been returned for insufficient funds, suffered the loss from Richard’s theft.

The investigation that led to today’s proceeding was conducted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Brunswick Police Department.