WHEELING, W.Va. – Two cousins are scheduled to be sentenced to prison this morning for a family embezzlement that drained some $5 million from tiny N&W Poca Division FCU, forcing the liquidation of the Bluefield credit union almost two years ago.
Rebecca Poe, who was assistant manager and daughter of the credit union CEO, and her cousin Pamela Mullins, a teller, have pleaded guilty to criminal charges in the massive fraud that sunk the $7 million credit union, chartered in 1970 to serve employees of the Norfolk and Western Railway.
The president, Deborah Bailey, has not been named in the criminal case but was charged in a civil suit brought by NCUA with engineering the scheme. NCUA claims Bailey, her husband and their daughters stole the money by making fake deposits into their accounts and manipulating phony loans.
The fictitious deposits scheme began small and grew steadily, according to NCUA, to as much as $14,000 a month in 2002. The suit also claims the credit union made hundreds of thousands of dollars in debits on behalf of the family members which were never posted to their accounts.
NCUA’s suit names as participants in the scheme: Deborah Bailey and her husband Kenneth Bailey; their daughter Rebecca Poe and her husband Joey Poe; and their cousin Pamela Mullins and her son Christopher Mullins, who was a member of the credit union’s supervisory committee. Lawyers for the defendants did not return phone calls seeking comment.
The NCUA suit is still pending.
The credit union was chartered to serve employees of the Norfolk and Western Railway and later added employees of American Electric Power Co. (formerly Appalachian Power Co.).
