A former vice president and controller at Little Rock's One Bank & Trust admitted Wednesday to a federal judge that he used bank funds to pay roughly $5,000 a month in personal credit-card bills from 2009 through 2011.
Matthew Sweet, 42, pleaded guilty to a single money-laundering charge stemming from a Jan. 20, 2009, financial transaction involving $2,580.50. In exchange for the plea, the 59 other charges that he faced were dropped.
First Assistant U.S. Attorney Pat Harris told U.S. District Judge Leon Holmes that Sweet has repaid the full amount he stole over three years -- $110,665.74 -- after borrowing the funds from a relative. Harris said he will recommend that Sweet receive probation in lieu of prison time when he is sentenced at a later date.
The maximum statutory penalty that Sweet faces is up to 20 years in prison followed by up to three years of supervised release and a fine of up to $500,000. The judge isn't obligated to follow prosecutors' recommendations.
Harris said that One Bank managers discovered the theft in early 2012 and confronted Sweet, who admitted he had used bank funds to issue cashier's checks to pay his monthly bills from Citicards and USAA Savings Bank and then moved bank funds around to pay the cashier's checks and hide the theft.
Sweet admitted to the embezzlement and on Feb. 29, 2012, signed a confidential separation agreement allowing him to formally resign from the bank in exchange for making the restitution payments through two cashier's checks, one for $9,662.25 to the bank and another for $101,003.49 to Layton Stuart, the bank's owner at the time who is now deceased.
Sweet's duties consisted of managing the bank's general ledger, authorizing cashier's checks, managing employee payroll and reconciling certain internal checking accounts, including a clearing account for all credit-card transactions, Harris said.
Sweet was represented at the hearing by attorney Chad Green.
Metro on 01/08/2015