MAHONING COUNTY Woman indicted in check scheme

The woman's employer noticed that too much money was paid out in the case.
YOUNGSTOWN -- A Mahoning County grand jury handed up an indictment against a city woman on charges that she illegally collected disability checks.
Diane L. Morris, 34, of West Boston Avenue, faces charges of grand theft, unauthorized use of property and telecommunications fraud.
Morris works for the Compensation Programs of Ohio, which processes disability claims for various companies and organizations, including the Ohio Conference of Plasterers and Cement Masons, said assistant county prosecutors Michael Maillis and Jay Macejko.
Maillis said that between January 2000 and January 2001, Morris processed fraudulent disability claims in her own name from the plasters' and masons' union account, and had checks totaling $69,000 mailed to her home.
"She is not disabled, nor is she a plasterer or a mason," Macejko said. "She just put herself in with a claim."
Company officials noticed a red flag when the amount paid to Morris rose higher than what should normally have been paid to a disability claimant, which is how she got caught, Maillis said.
At one point, Morris began issuing the checks in the name of a male relative. Prosecutors said they are not sure whether he was aware of the situation so he has not been charged.
What else: Also indicted Thursday was Wayne P. Gilliam, 19, of Castalia Avenue, on charges of complicity to traffic in marijuana and trafficking in crack cocaine. James L. Mosley IV, 21, of Bassett Lane, faces the same charges.
They are accused by police of after selling drugs to an undercover informant, said assistant prosecutor Robert Duffrin.
The prosecutor's office already is looking at Gilliam because of a previous drug charge, which came while he was out on $5,000 bond on an aggravated murder charge.
He is accused of shooting 18-year-old Anton Flint to death Jan. 14. Prosecutors have filed a motion to revoke his bond on the murder charge. A hearing was to have been Thursday in common pleas court but was postponed until April 24.
Gilliam's bond, set by Municipal Judge Robert A. Douglas Jr., has stirred controversy with city officials, the victim's Forest View Drive family and others.
When charged with trafficking in marijuana while out on bond, Municipal Judge Robert P. Milich set a $100,000 bond. Gilliam's lawyer and the county prosecutor's office agreed, however, that he remain in jail pending the outcome of his bond revocation hearing.
Gilliam's murder case was bound over to a county grand jury in late January, but the county prosecutor's office has yet to present the evidence for indictment.
Patrolman Michael Lambert, a member of the Youngstown Police Department vice squad, arrested Gilliam on the drug charges. The officer has said that Gilliam, aware of the drug investigation and feeling the pressure, showed up at the vice squad and surrendered to police.