FBI News:

ALBUQUERQUE—Deborah Gayle Wood, 56, currently residing in Grove, Okla., was sentenced Tuesday, March 26, to eight months in prison, followed by five years of supervised release, for her bank fraud conviction.

Wood also was ordered to pay $4,390.93 in restitution and a $10,000 fine.

Wood pled guilty in December 2011 to a felony information charging her with bank fraud. In her plea agreement, Wood admitted that, from 2004 to 2005, while she was employed as a trust officer by the Los Alamos National Bank, she defrauded the bank on numerous occasions by obtaining reimbursement for personal expenditures that she falsely represented as expenditures made on behalf of a bank trust account client.

Wood also admitted using a bank credit card issued in the client’s name on numerous occasions to make personal purchases that she falsely represented as expenses made on behalf of the client.

Court filings reflect that, between 2003 and 2006, Wood was the trust officer for the trust account of an elderly client suffering from Alzheimer’s disease.

As trust officer, Wood’s responsibilities included making sure that the client’s living expenses were provided for and that her bills were paid in a timely manner.

In the course of her work, Wood regularly purchased items for her personal use and falsely informed the bank that the items were for the client’s benefit and should be charged to the client’s trust account.

When the bank learned that Wood had engaged in a multi-year pattern of fraud against the client’s trust account, the bank reimbursed the client by crediting her trust account in the amount of $101,391.10.

The case was investigated by the Santa Fe Resident Agency of the FBI and was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney John C. Anderson.