Carrie Porter admitted to betraying her employer, her loved ones and an entire community when she removed stacks of $100 bills at various times for 12 years while she worked as a bank teller.
By the time she was caught, she had removed a total of $285,125 from First Community Bank. She was sentenced Tuesday to 18 months in prison, nine months less than what her ex-employer had requested.
"I want to make it right," an emotional Porter said while on the witness stand. "I know I abused their trust. It's a horrible feeling that I have to live with. They trusted me, and I let them down and I let my family down."
Porter, 49, was fired in April from the Cave City branch after being employed there for 18 years. Her charge of embezzlement by a bank employee was filed in July in U.S. District Court.
As the shame mounted, Porter said she wished that she had found the courage to stop stealing and walk into her boss' office and admit to what she had done. Instead, she was caught after employees noticed a discrepancy between what was in the vault and what was in the bank's records. Porter, who was on vacation that day, had falsified the records to cover up what she had done.
The 18-month federal prison sentence looms for Porter as she tries to pay nearly 80% of what she stole through property sales and liquidating her 401(K) before reporting to prison in Fort Worth on Jan. 20. She promised the judge she eventually would pay "every cent" of it back.
U.S. District Court Judge Susan Webber Wright agreed to go below the recommended guideline of 21 to 27 months, acknowledging the defendant's effort to pay the full restitution.
Porter's attorney, Blair Arnold, said she made a full admission to her employer about how much she stole even before authorities got involved.
Of all the people he has represented in his 40-plus years of practicing law, "no one has been more remorseful," Arnold said.
Porter sat on the witness stand and admitted in open court Tuesday that she was a thief. Even after she walked out of the bank for the first time with $10,000 in her purse, she continued to keep doing it once every three or four months during the next 12 years, she said.
"Where is the $285,000 now?" prosecutor Patrick Harris asked her.
"It's gone," she told him.
During his cross-examination, Harris also asked Porter whether she thought she needed to go to prison for what she did.
"I do, but I pray that I don't [go]," she said as she struggled to control her sobs.
The median price for a home in Arkansas is $140,200, according to Zillow. Porter stole enough to purchase, in full, two average-sized homes.
The state called one witness, Laura Brissey, an in-house attorney for First Community Bank, which has 26 locations mostly in small towns across Arkansas and Missouri.
"Our bank is needed in the market," said Brissey, who became emotional herself as she described how First Community Bank was built 22 years ago from the ground up by small- town families who invested their faith and life savings.
"When a football coach needs money for uniforms, they call our bank," she said. "When a librarian needs more books, they call our bank."
Brissey said if Porter needed money, she could have gone to the loan officer to seek help.
"We take care of our own," Brissey said, pointing out that the defendant violated that exceptional level of trust offered by executives at First Community Bank.
Porter sobbed softly during Brissey's testimony.
Porter's husband and four more of her family members attended the sentencing. They declined to speak after it was over.
They wept when the judge announced she was sentencing Porter to 18 months. They sighed in relief when she allowed Porter to spend Thanksgiving and Christmas with her family before reporting to prison.
Originally, the judge set a date of Jan. 6 for Porter to report, but Arnold requested a later date because his client needed at least 60 days for the land sale to go through. Arnold also said the timber on the 6 acres of land that Porter is selling would be cut down and sold and would go a long way toward covering what she owes.
Porter was given several opportunities to speak during Tuesday's hourlong hearing. She didn't pass up any chance to convey her regret.
"You can see the sorrow in my heart," Porter told the judge. "I just want to make it right."
Metro on 11/20/2019