GREENBELT, Md. (December 1, 2010)—Lucy Lynn Bradburn, age 43, of Ridge, Maryland, pleaded guilty November 24 to mail fraud in connection with stealing $104,926 from her employer.
The guilty plea was announced by United States Attorney for the District of Maryland Rod J. Rosenstein and Mark Clookie, Director of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service.
According to Bradburn’s plea, Bradburn was employed by IAP World Services, Inc. as a senior accountant/supply administrator in its Patuxent River, Maryland office. Her responsibilities included requesting payments for vendor services or supplies. Bradburn would complete payment requests and transmit them to IAP’s corporate office in Cape Canaveral, Florida. The corporate office would then send payment directly to the vendor, or if special handling was requested, would mail a corporate check back to its Patuxent River office.
From approximately November 2002 until December 2009, Bradburn prepared and signed at least 44 fictitious requests for payment to Sears for purported purchases by IAP at Sears. In fact, IAP had not made any of the purported purchases at Sears. At Bradburn’s request, IAP mailed the checks from the corporate office to the Patuxent River office. Bradburn used those checks to pay her personal Sears accounts.
The total value of the 44 checks that Bradburn obtained was approximately $104,926.58.
Bradburn faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison followed by five years of supervised release and a fine of $250,000. As part of her plea agreement, Bradburn agrees to pay $104,926.58 in restitution. U.S. District Judge Peter J. Messitte scheduled sentencing for February 24, 2011 at 9:30 a.m.
This law enforcement action is part of President Barack Obama’s Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force. President Obama established the interagency Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force to wage an aggressive, coordinated and proactive effort to investigate and prosecute financial crimes. The task force includes representatives from a broad range of federal agencies, regulatory authorities, inspectors general, and state and local law enforcement who, working together, bring to bear a powerful array of criminal and civil enforcement resources. The task force is working to improve efforts across the federal executive branch, and with state and local partners, to investigate and prosecute significant financial crimes, ensure just and effective punishment for those who perpetrate financial crimes, combat discrimination in the lending and financial markets, and recover proceeds for victims of financial crimes.
United States Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein thanked the NCIS for its investigative work and praised Assistant U.S. Attorney Mara Zusman Greenberg, who is prosecuting the case.
Source: Office of United States Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein