SavvySugar

Not So Smooth Criminal Steals $11 Million For Love

SavvySugar — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 04:30:12 -0700

Crazy in love might be one way to describe Michelle Cawthra, a former Colorado Department of Revenue employee who stole $11 million in unclaimed tax refunds from her employer. With her morals blinded by love, Michelle deposited unclaimed tax refunds and other state money into her ex-boyfriend's bank accounts over the course of two years.

She received a 24-year sentence after pleading guilty to racketeering and testified, "I did things I don't think I otherwise would have done had I not been in love with him." Those things included using co-workers' passwords, forging documents, and creating fake businesses to deflect detection. Talk about a nightmare employee. The crime beneficiary, ex-beau Hysear Randell, is currently on trial for theft, forgery, computer crime, and racketeering.

Your Two Cents: Have You Tried ID Theft Prevention Services?

SavvySugar — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 14:00:44 -0700

A company called Lifelock has been getting a lot of attention for its generous and confident ID Theft Prevention plan.

Lifelock boasts a $1 million service guarantee that it will protect your identity and money. A membership costs about $110 a year and Lifelock works with credit bureaus to set free fraud alerts on your behalf, checks in with the bureaus every 90 days, requests that your name be removed from preapproved credit-card and junk-mail lists and offers a complicated identity monitoring package. Its motto is "We will do whatever it takes to help you recover your good name and we will spend up to $1 million to do it."

More than 65 percent of SavvySugar readers have had their credit information compromised before so I assume many of you have researched protection services. Have you tried any?

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Have You Ever Had Something Stolen?

SavvySugar — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 14:04:29 -0700

Arriving to a broken-in apartment after Thanksgiving break during college was an overwhelmingly violating feeling. Laptop? Gone. DVD collection? Vanished.

It was upsetting to me and my roommates that someone had forcefully entered our apartment and made our lives harder by having to buy replacement items, but we understood they were just things and felt lucky nobody was hurt. Have you ever had the unfortunate experience of someone stealing from you?

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