SAN JOSE – LAWFUEL – US Law, US Lawyer – A former senior vice president of a Redwood City bank was sentenced today to serve a term of 15 months in prison, and ordered to pay at total of $188,714 in restitution, following her conviction for bank fraud. Vivian Michelle Titus was sentenced by United States District Judge Ronald M. Whyte, who also ordered her to serve a three-year term of supervised release following her term of imprisonment. Ms. Titus was ordered to surrender on May 15, 2007, to begin serving her sentence.
Ms. Titus, 44, formerly of Woodside but now living in Redwood City, pleaded guilty on October 20, 2006, to a single count of bank fraud, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1344. According to the plea agreement, Ms. Titus admitted that, while she was employed as a Senior Vice-President for Bay Area Bank (formerly Mid-Peninsula Bank) in Redwood City, she fraudulently opened a $250,000 line of credit in the name of a friend who was also a customer of the bank. Ms. Titus admitted to forging the customer’s name on loan documents and that she used the fraudulently-obtained funds as a down payment on a new house and for personal expenses.
A federal grand jury sitting in San Jose originally returned an indictment on June 15, 2006, charging Ms. Titus with six counts of bank fraud and six counts of embezzlement by a bank official. Titus was charged with embezzling, between August 2001 and January 2004, a total of $700,000 from her employers, Mid- Peninsula Bank and First Republic Bank in Palo Alto. In addition to the fraudulent $250,000 transaction to which she pleaded guilty, the indictment alleged that Ms. Titus also defrauded two other bank customers: one by fraudulently establishing another $250,000 line of credit in the name of a second Mid-Peninsula Bank customer, and the other by forging and cashing a $200,000 check drawn against the business account of a customer at First Republic Bank in Palo Alto. According to the indictment and sentencing documents submitted to the court, Ms. Titus used the proceeds from the third embezzlement to repay the second victim after her theft came to light.
AUSA David Callaway represented the United States at sentencing. The prosecution is the result of an investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Further Information:
Case #: CR 06-00427 RMW
A copy of this press release may be found on the U.S. Attorney’s Office’s website at www.usdoj.gov/usao/can.
Electronic court filings and further procedural and docket information are available at https://ecf.cand.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/login.pl.
Judges’ calendars with schedules for upcoming court hearings can be viewed on the court’s website at www.cand.uscourts.gov.
All press inquiries to the U.S. Attorney’s Office should be directed to Luke Macaulay at (415) 436-6757 or by email at Luke.Macaulay@usdoj.gov.
