EVANSVILLE, Ind. — An Evansville man was sentenced to 16 months in federal prison after he used his accounting position to embezzle more than $87,000 from his employer.
Court documents in the case against Patrick Garrett say the man devised and executed a direct bill and fake invoice scheme from April 9, 2021, through July 16, 2021, to steal from his employer.
Garrett, who was employed as a sales specialist for a Gibson County business, was responsible for handling accounts payable and accounts receivable. The documents say Garrett bought around 62 items for himself, charging the purchases to his employer without authorization.
Some of these purchases included a car, five gas motorcycles, three electric scooters, an Apple iPad Pro, an Apple iMac Pro desktop computer, an Apple MacBook Pro laptop computer, and two drones.
To try to hide the fraud, the document says Garrett entered false or altered information about the purchases into the accounting system. This included invoices for services he claimed were provided by Garrett Ventures.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Indiana says Garrett Ventures is a company that Garrett made in 2018. He served as the Chief Financial Officer. No services were ever provided by the company to Garrett’s employer.
After pleading guilty to charges of wire fraud, bank fraud and money laundering, Garrett was sentenced to 16 months in federal prison. As part of the sentence, Garrett was ordered to pay restitution of $87,192.84, forfeit any illicitly purchased items, and be supervised by the U.S. Probation Office for two years following his release.
