Texas Bank Exec Sentenced For Misappropriating As Much As $1.15 Million From Bank & Customers

Emma Garza Vigil, 48, of McAllen, Texas, was sentenced to 51 months in prison for misappropriating as much as $1,150,000 from Lone Star National Bank where she had been employed as a vice president & senior lending officer. According to authorities, Vigil used her position to conduct hundreds of thousands of dollars in fraudulent debit transactions from her loan customers’ bank accounts. She also fraudulently inducing the approval of a commercial loan, the proceeds of which were used for her own benefit. Vigil plead guilty to two counts of bank fraud last December. Vigil's misappropriation scheme lasted four years beginning in 2005. According to the DOJ announcement:

"Vigil conducted the fraudulent debit transactions in a variety of ways. In some
instances, she would fill out a loan advance slip with her customer’s loan
account information and request a teller to generate a cashier’s check made out
to the customer. Vigil would later forge the customer’s name on the check’s
endorsement line, wait for a period of time and then present the check to a
teller for cash. In other cases, Vigil simply filled out a checking or savings
account withdrawal slip with her customer’s account information and presented
the slip to a teller for cash. Vigil often informed the tellers that the cash
from these transactions would be hand-delivered to her customers under a
“banking made easy” approach to customer service. Vigil also employed a number
of other tactics to conceal her fraud including stealing from customers she knew
did not closely monitor their accounts and conducting transactions for amounts
that resembled monthly loan payments owed by her customers."

Vigil also admitted that she used bank client’s credit information to execute a $179,500 commercial loan application under the fake name Gilbert Posada Arana for her own benefit. As part of her sentencing, Vigil has also been ordered to pay $589,494.74 in restitution.

Read the story here and here.

Read the DOJ announcement here.

Hat Tip: Reader Joe.