Ex-aide pleads guilty to stealing nearly $23K from congresswoman to pay down credit card debt
A former staffer for Rep. Marcy Kaptur, D-Ohio, pleaded guilty Tuesday to siphoning over $20,000 from her former boss's bank account to pay her own credit card bills.
Courtney Hruska, 40, admitted to committing felony wire fraud at a court hearing in Alexandria, Virginia. The charge carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison, but Hruska is likely to receive far less time when she is sentenced by U.S. District Judge Leonie M. Brinkema in June.
Hruska told prosecutors she didn't think she'd be found out because she knew the victim was not "tech savvy" and "did not use electronic banking in any form" so she would not get real-time alerts about the payments, the statement of facts said. The victim discovered the transfers in late 2024, when a personal check she wrote was returned for insufficient funds, the court filing said.
Hruska initially tried to claim she wasn't the person responsible, the statement of facts said. "Throughout the investigation into the defendants conduct, the defendant repeatedly told investigators both state and federal as well as Victim and Victims representatives, that 'hackers from the dark web' must have been responsible for causing the wires to be sent from Victims bank account to pay the defendants personal credit card bills," the filing said. "In truth, these repeated claims were false, and the defendant knew they were false."
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/ex-aide-pleads-guilty-to-stealing-nearly-23k-from-congresswoman-to-pay-down-credit-card-debt/ar-AA1ZQAsa?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=LCTS&cvid=69cc1cfe0c1f4dd6b8703b38286a911f&ei=39