Federal Prison Terms Handed Down to Houston Women for Targeting Elderly in Scam

John E. Murphy, Acting U.S. Attorney, announced that in Waco today, 50-year-old Tyra Arnett Green and 24-year-old Amanda Eastman, of Houston, Texas, were sentenced to five years in federal prison for their roles in a fraudulent scheme that victimized an 89-year-old Waco woman.

United States Chief District Judge Walter S. Smith sentenced the defendants to 30 months’ imprisonment for conspiracy to commit wire fraud plus 30 months’ imprisonment for wire fraud. Judge Smith also ordered that each defendant pay a $1,000 fine and be placed under supervised release for a period of three years after completing her prison term.

Between February 4, 2009, and February 9, 2009, the defendants along with co-defendant 59-year-old Louis Dickerson of Houston, Texas, devised and implemented a scheme to steal money from elderly Waco woman. On February 5, 2009, Eastman approached the victim in Waco business parking lot with a black bag or folder which contained three or four bundles of cash and asked her if the money belonged to the victim. Eastman convinced the victim that she was a bank employee and asked the victim to take her to her bank which the victim did.

Eastman subsequently came out of the bank and informed her victim that the bag contained $350,000 and since it was “found” money, that the victim was entitled to her share—$167,000. Eastman, admittedly, told her victim that they could each pay a fee of $22,867 to the government in order to legally take possession of the “found” money faster. The victim made arrangements to withdraw the funds from her bank, however, the bank informed her that they did not have the entire amount of cash on hand and only released $10,000 to the victim. Eastman subsequently attempted to get her victim to cash personal checks at local check cashing businesses as well as obtain cash advances from personal credit cards to make up the difference. Eastman even convinced her victim to give her approximately $50,000 worth of the victim’s jewelry to keep in a safe deposit box at the bank where Eastman claimed she worked. At the end of the day, the victim spoke on the phone with Eastman’s purported boss at the bank, Louis Dickerson, who instructed the victim to go home and wait for their phone call to arrange for the pick up of the rest of the victim’s fee.

On February 9, 2009, Dickerson called the victim at home and told her he had her $167,000. Dickerson instructed her to go to her bank, withdraw an additional $15,000 and meet him to collect her money. Detectives arrested Dickerson and Green at the time of the exchange. Authorities subsequently arrested Eastman in Livingston, Texas.