Woman admits stealing $283K

Lauren Marciano gets probation for theft from two businesses

NORRISTOWN » A Trappe woman has a decade of court supervision in her future and will have a monthly restitution bill after she admitted to embezzling more than $283,000 from two Lower Gwynedd businesses, owned by a relative, for which she worked.

Lauren Marie Marciano, 34, of the first block of Oak Road, was sentenced in Montgomery County Court on Thursday to 10 years of probation after she pleaded guilty to a felony charge of theft by deception in connection with thefts that occurred between January 2014 and August 2016 from the two businesses for which she worked as office manager.

Judge Todd D. Eisenberg, who accepted a plea agreement in the case, also ordered Marciano to pay a total of $283,733 in restitution in connection with the thefts from Gwynedd Valley Custom

Builders and STH Carpentry. Under the agreement, Marciano must pay $400 each month.

An investigation began in October 2016 when the owner of the businesses, identified in court papers as Marciano’s father, reported the thefts to Lower Gwynedd police, who launched an investigation. Detectives said the investigation determined that Marciano wrote 384 checks to herself and deposited them into her personal bank account.

As office manager, Marciano was authorized to write checks from the companies but only to vendors, according to the criminal complaint filed by Lower Gwynedd Detective Glenn Fowler.

Detectives alleged Marciano forged the signatures of company officials when she wrote checks to herself. Company officials, including Marciano’s father, told detectives they never signed or authorized Marciano to write or sign any of the checks in question, according to the criminal complaint.

When detectives confronted Marciano about the thefts she admitted to using a company computer in the office along DeKalb Pike to print and write the checks, according to the arrest affidavit.

“Lauren explained she would enter a vendor name in the accounting software but would actually write the check to herself,” Fowler alleged in the criminal complaint, adding Marciano said she would cash or deposit the checks into a personal bank account.

Investigators were able to collect bank records that confirmed the thefts, court papers indicate.