NEWPORT NEWS, Va. — A Mathews woman was sentenced to four years in prison for her connection to a $1.4 million fraud scheme.
Michelle M. Holt, 52, was sentenced for fraud and theft of government property in connection with an extensive timekeeping fraud that resulted in losses of over $1.4 million, which she was ordered to pay in restitution.
Court documents state the 52-year-old was previously employed as a federal employee for the Department of Defense. She was a secretary for the U.S. Air Force, Air Combat Command, Communication Support Squadron at Joint Base Langley-Eustis.
Holt was salaried on the General Schedule grade for the federal civilian workforce making her entitled to overtime pay if authorized by her employer, other forms of holiday and annual leave and premium pay for federal holidays worked.
An investigation determined that from December 2001 to July 2018, Holt falsely claimed over 42,000 hours in unauthorized overtime for hours she did not work, unauthorized holiday and sick leave and unauthorized annual leave. The unauthorized hours amounted to more than $1.4 million in losses to the United States.
Holt accomplished the fraud by making manual retroactive adjustments to protected computer time attendance systems to add overtime and reverse leave and holiday leave taken. In order to do this, she used another employee's login information without the employee's knowledge or authorization.
