GREENFIELD, Mass. — A former head teller for $509 million Freedom Credit Union pleaded guilty to stealing more than $90,000 from a membersm accounts.
Meghan Porter pleaded guilty in Franklin Superior Court last week to two charges of larceny over $250 by a single scheme. Porter was head teller at the Greenfield branch of Freedom CU, based in Springfield, Mass.
She is scheduled to be sentenced on Sept. 24.
According to court documents, Porter was indicted last year on five charges of larceny over $250 by a single scheme.
On June 26, 2012, the president and security director of Freedom CU contacted the Greenfield Police Department regarding the theft of money from accounts of a credit union member. Freedom had begun its own investigation when the member brought the apparent theft to its attention.
Court records state, "Based on the preliminary investigation, the perpetrator of the theft was alleged to be the Defendant, Meghan Porter." Further investigation by Freedom and Det. Lt. Daniel McCarthy of the Greenfield Police Department established that approximately $92,000 had been taken from two accounts of the credit union member.
Documentation generated in the course of the investigation established that between November 2011 and June 2012, there were 46 separate unauthorized withdrawals from the accounts in question.
"The documentation establishes that the Defendant was the employee who entered the withdrawals in Freedom's computer system," court records state.
Freedom was unable to locate any withdrawals slips to support or authorize the withdrawals and during the timeframe for most recent withdrawals. Porter was observed in surveillance photographs as the teller conducting the transactions.
