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Melissa Meole, 35, of North Branford, pleaded guilty to wire fraud and filing false tax returns for multiple schemes that spanned several years.
Meole, who was employed at the Bridgeport Health Care Center Inc., was responsible for processing payroll and for handling the finances of the Bridgeport Manor resident trust account.
U.S. Attorney John Durham said that from 2015 to October 2018, Meole stole more than $415,000 by writing checks to cash out of the facilities’ resident trust accounts, which held the personal funds of residents. Meole then deposited the cash into her personal bank account.
Durham said Meole also stole more than $29,000 by writing false payroll checks to current and former employees and then depositing those checks into her bank account by forging the employees’ signatures.
When Meole was fired in October 2018, she proceeded to defraud another employer of more than $9,000 by stealing and fraudulently depositing into her own account certain checks that were returned to the company, often for incorrect addresses. Durham said Meole also defrauded three banks in a check-kiting scheme.
When she is sentenced, Meole faces up to 20 years in prison and she has agreed to pay $456,594.56 to victims of her schemes, and $103,217 plus interest and penalties to the IRS. Meole remains released on a $200,000 bond following her arrest on Sept. 17 last year.
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