Woman sentenced in $1.7M fraud case

The defendant has to make restitution of $2,149,004 and forfeit two properties.
YOUNGSTOWN -- Vicky Sites, former Forum Health accounts manager, has been sentenced to four years in federal prison for interstate transport of stolen property and attempted tax evasion.
Sites, formerly of Newton Falls, was sentenced Monday afternoon in Akron federal court. As part of her plea agreement, wire fraud and two additional counts of attempted tax evasion were dismissed.
The government said Sites, who now lives in Pawleys Island, S.C., embezzled roughly $1.7 million and used it to buy luxury cars and homes in South Carolina. Her plea agreement requires that she forfeit two properties on Pawley's Island.
Judge John R. Adams ordered that Sites serve three years' supervised release after prison. No fine was imposed, but she must make restitution to Forum Health of $2,149,004.
Sites remains free on $50,000 unsecured bond until the federal Bureau of Prisons designates a prison for her to serve her time.
The case was investigated by the FBI and IRS and prosecuted by Justin J. Roberts, an assistant U.S. attorney based in Cleveland.
Sites was indicted in June. She pleaded guilty at arraignment on July 20.
Her plea agreement requires that she cooperate with IRS agents in the determination and collection of taxes and interest owed.
The indictment describes Forum Health as a conglomerate of hospitals and outpatient health care clinics in the Youngstown/Warren area. Sites had disbursement authority over several Forum Health accounts.
The crimes
Sites misappropriated Forum Health care funds by causing checks to be forged and written for her benefit, transferring a large portion of the proceeds to South Carolina. She concealed her embezzlement by making false entries in the accounting records at Forum Health.
Sites used the funds to buy "several homes in South Carolina and several luxury Mercedes and Corvette automobiles and to pay off credit card expenses," the indictment states. From June 26, 1998, through Dec. 23, 2002, Sites initiated about 50 unauthorized checks for roughly $1.7 million, the government said.
Also, Sites willfully attempted to evade income taxes of nearly $612,000 owed the IRS for 2000, 2001 and 2002 by filing false tax returns that failed to report the income she received through embezzlement, the government said.