WOMAN ADMITS EMBEZZLING $100K FROM HER BRIGHTON EMPLOYER

Original Story: freep.com

A Brighton woman pleaded guilty Tuesday to embezzling from her employer, to whom she tearfully whispered an apology as she was led away to a holding cell. A Birmingham criminal lawyer provides counsel and strategic advice to individuals, corporations, and other entities facing criminal investigations or charges.

The plea deal includes a sentence agreement that will put Brynn Annette Robinson, 35, behind bars for three to 15 years for embezzling more than $100,000 from AArbor Colorants Corp. on Citation Drive in Brighton. The plea deal also calls for Robinson to pay $200,000 in restitution.

Sentencing is Jan. 7 in Judge Michael P. Hatty’s courtroom.

In entering the plea, Robinson acknowledged that she used the company’s credit cards between March 2012 and August for her personal use. A Salt Lake City criminal lawyer is following this story closely.

“I’m very sorry,” she whispered to one of the company co-owners, who was sitting in the courtroom.

Robinson entered the plea as a habitual offender. Her criminal history includes a 2003 conviction for embezzling and using a financial transaction device without permission in Washtenaw County and a 2010 attempted filing of a false police report in Shiawassee County. A Hartford employment lawyer is reviewing the details of this case.

AArbor Colorants is a privately held company in business since 1987 that is a “customer-driven flushed colors and dry color pigments manufacturer,” according to its website at www.aarbor.com.

Former Tyco CEO Denied Parole Again

Story first appeared in USA Today.

NEW YORK – The imprisoned former Tyco CEO lost his first parole bid Thursday as a state board ruled that releasing him now would tend to minimize his corporate crimes and affect public safety.

The decision means the 65-year-old former executive will remain a prison inmate, his status since a 2005 conviction and 8-to-25-year sentence on charges of looting nearly $600 million in bonuses and other payments from the global products and services firm he once headed.

The case, which resulted in similar charges and conviction of the former Tyco CFO, came to symbolize corporate greed during the bull market of the 1990s.

The three-member board panel concluded that discretionary release is not presently warranted due to concern for the public safety and welfare.

The board said it took notice of the absence of any prior convictions and clean record behind bars, including a merit certificate. However, the panel concluded that early release at this time would not be compatible with the welfare of society at large, and would tend to deprecate the seriousness of his offenses.

The next possible parole board hearing won't come until approximately September 2013.

The former CEO has maintained his trial was flawed. But the Court of Appeals, New York's top court, upheld his conviction.

Although he remains a prison inmate, he was transferred to a minimum-security facility in Manhattan in January when he was approved for a work-release program following five previous denials.

His latest home is less than 2 miles north of the $30 million Fifth Avenue residence where he lived large during his Tyco days — decorating the costly apartment with a now notorious $6,000 shower curtain, a $15,000 umbrella stand and art by Monet and others.


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Cancer Society Embezzler Out of Prison

First appeared in USA Today

A former chief administrative officer imprisoned for stealing nearly $8 million from the American Cancer Society of Ohio more than a decade ago has been released and is on house arrest.

Daniel Wiant fled to Europe in 2000 after wiring $6.9 million in stolen funds from the organization to a bank account in Austria. He was brought back to face charges after he called his wife to tell her what he had done and she called police.

Wiant, now 47, pleaded guilty to four embezzlement-related charges. He was sentenced in 2001 to 13½ years in prison, but the sentence was shortened for good behavior. Authorities say he has been on house arrest since Feb. 1 and will begin five years' probation after the house arrest ends March 26.

A Dec. 31 posting on Wiant's Facebook page said that he would "start my new job Tuesday a fresh beginning for a new year," The Columbus Dispatch reported.

Wiant worked for the cancer society for six years before he was charged with stealing $6.9 million, money that later was returned to the charity. The FBI said he'd been stealing money from the organization for three years before that. He had taken about $1 million that he used for such things as adding pear trees to his yard, buying all-terrain vehicles and renting an apartment for a co-worker, authorities said.

Before the society hired Wiant, he had been convicted of credit card theft in the 1980s and the theft of $21,000 from a Hawaii food bank in the 1990s and had faked education and job credentials to get hired, according to the Dispatch.

"He was a criminal — pathological, by all accounts," said Greg Donaldson, a spokesman for the American Cancer Society in Atlanta. Donaldson helped the Ohio chapter deal with the crime and the negative publicity.

He said that what Wiant did "was a reminder that charities can be victimized and we have to be vigilant."

A spokesman for the U.S. Bureau of Prisons in Washington, D.C., said Wiant went to a prison in McKean, Pa., and then was transferred to Elkton, south of Youngstown in eastern Ohio. From Nov. 1 to Feb. 1, he was in a halfway house in the Atlanta area. Burke couldn't say why Wiant was sent to an Atlanta halfway house, but he said prisoners usually ask to be close to their families.

Prisons spokesman Chris Burke wouldn't comment on where Wiant is living. But information online indicates that Wiant's wife moved to Acworth, Ga., near Atlanta and that Wiant is living with her there, the newspaper reported.

Kathy Wiant pledged to remain loyal to her husband after his arrest, saying she would "eagerly await his return home" from prison.

There was no Acworth listing for the Wiants. Messages were left Monday by The Associated Press at a Georgia telephone number listed on the Web for a Kathleen Wiant and a Daniel Wiant. It was not immediately clear whether that was the correct number.

In addition to getting back the $6.9 million, the cancer society also received an insurance reimbursement and some restitution from Wiant, Donaldson said. Wiant also owes $1.5 million for a judgment from a lawsuit.

The charity has since instituted centralized financial management nationwide, Donaldson said.