KNOXVILLE, Tenn. – On February 3, 2022, Michelle Clabough, 45, of Knoxville, was sentenced to a term of imprisonment of 44 months by the Honorable R. Leon Jordan, in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee at Knoxville.
As part of the plea agreement filed with the Court, Clabough pleaded guilty to two counts of forging private entity securities, in violations of 18 U.S.C. § 513(a), one count of filing a false statement, in violation of 26 U.S.C. § 7206(1), and one count of filing a false bankruptcy record, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1519. She was sentenced to 44 months imprisonment, followed by three years of supervised release. Additionally, she was ordered to pay restitution in full in the amount of $725,770 to her former employer and $134,421 to the Internal Revenue Service.
According to documents filed in Court, during a seven-year period while Clabough was employed as an office manager, she forged more than 250 checks and embezzled $725,770 from her employer. During this same time period, Clabough submitted fraudulent tax returns that did not include her stolen income, which resulted in a tax loss of $134,421. Additionally, Clabough submitted a false record in a Chapter 13 bankruptcy proceeding in which she failed to disclose the income she obtained through her embezzlement of funds.
The criminal indictment was a result of an investigation by the Internal Revenue Service – Criminal Investigation.
Assistant United States Attorney Jennifer Kolman represented the United States.
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