SAN FRANCISCO – Stephanie Simontacchi was sentenced to 29 months in prison for lender fraud, embezzlement of credit union resources, and tax evasion in link with techniques to use her access as an accountant to enrich herself at the expenditure of two former employers, introduced U.S. Attorney Stephanie M. Hinds, Federal Bureau of Investigation Unique Agent in Demand Sean Ragan, and IRS Criminal Investigation Division (IRS-CI) Special Agent in Demand Mark H. Pearson. The sentence was handed down by the Hon. William H. Orrick, U.S. District Choose.
In accordance to her plea agreement, Simontacchi, 48, of Petaluma, was used as a bookkeeper and controller at Cavallo Issue Lodge (CPL), a lodge in close proximity to Sausalito, Calif., from December 2009 by means of April 2016. While utilized at CPL, Simontacchi experienced accessibility to CPL’s accounting documents programs and experienced signatory authority about CPL’s bank accounts. Simontacchi admitted that concerning October 2012 and March 2016, she utilised her competencies as an accountant and accessibility to CPL’s accounting techniques to steal roughly 81 accounts payable checks issued by CPL and accounts receivable checks supposed for CPL. Simontacchi deposited the checks into her personal bank accounts for her personal private attain. Simontacchi acknowledged in her plea arrangement that her wrong representations and statements triggered economic establishments to element with about $384,363.28 that belonged to CPL.
In addition, Simontacchi admitted that concerning April 2016 and April 2019, she also was utilized as a senior accountant and accounting supervisor at Redwood Credit history Union (RCU), a credit rating union, the place she was dependable for processing voided cashier’s checks and other accounting-connected duties for the credit union. Simontacchi admitted that she employed her place to embezzle and misapply around 35 checks such as voided cashier’s checks returned to RCU by its users, United States Treasury checks, and Condition of California checks intended for RCU. She deposited the checks into her private lender and credit history card accounts for particular use and employed the resources to make payments toward a particular house equity line of credit score. Combined, the checks amounted to at the very least $437,162.24.
Even further, Simontacchi admitted that in between 2014 and June 2020, she attempted to evade and defeat cash flow tax that she owed. Specifically, she triggered to be ready and filed fake tax returns for the calendar many years of 2013-2019. Simontacchi acknowledged that the overall tax loss from her misconduct was above $100,000.
On June 24, 2021, a federal grand jury indicted Simontacchi charging her with seven counts of lender fraud, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1344(2) seven counts of misapplication and embezzlement of credit score union resources, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 657 and 4 counts of tax evasion, in violation of 26 U.S.C. § 7201. Pursuant to her plea agreement, Simontacchi pleaded guilty to 1 count of each crime and has agreed to fork out at minimum $821,525.52 in restitution.
In addition to the jail time period, Choose Orrick ordered Simontacchi to provide three yrs of supervised launch to begin following her jail expression. Judge Orrick requested Simontacchi to surrender on or ahead of August 11, 2022 to start out serving her jail time period. The court docket has not yet scheduled a listening to to make ultimate determinations with regards to restitution.
Assistant U.S. Lawyers Amani S. Floyd and Kristina Eco-friendly are prosecuting this situation. The circumstance was investigated by the FBI and IRS-CI.
