Law Firm's Real Estate Closing Paralegal Gets 3 Years For Pilfering $260K From Company Escrow Account

From the Office of the U.S. Attorney (Atlanta, Georgia):

• OLA SUZANNE STOWERS, 34, of Dawsonville, Georgia, was sentenced to prison yesterday by United States District Judge Richard W. Story on charges of bank fraud and aggravated identity theft. STOWERS was sentenced to 3 years in prison, and ordered to pay $260,171.94 in restitution. STOWERS pleaded guilty to the charges on April 4, 2011.



• According to United States Attorney Yates, the charges and other information presented in court: From July 1999 through May 2010, STOWERS was a closing paralegal and database manager at a real estate law firm located in Atlanta, Georgia.



• In June 2008, STOWERS transferred $176,946.79 from a law firm escrow account into a Bank of America account that she had been directed to close, but instead kept open and changed the statement mailing address on the account to her residence. [...] In July 2008, STOWERS began writing checks from that Bank of America account for her own personal use, forging the signature of one of the firm’s partners.



• By March 2009, the Bank of America account had a balance of $959.93. In April 2010, STOWERS deposited $82,727.42 of checks made payable to the law firm into the Bank of America account, and again wrote checks from the account for her own personal use, again forging the signature of one of the firm’s partners.

For the U.S. Attorney press release, see Law Firm Paralegal Sentenced to Federal Prison for Stealing from Escrow Account (Defendant Wrote Over $260,000 in Checks From Firm’s Account for Her Own Personal Use).