45-day sentence for NSK embezzlement
Toolbox
Published: June 29, 2009
BENNINGTON – A Pownal man who pleaded guilty in March to embezzling about $95,000 from NSK Steering Systems America in Bennington was sentenced on Thursday to serve 45 days in prison.
Karl W. Austin, 35, of Lincoln Street, was sentenced on two felony counts of embezzlement in Bennington District Court.
Police had begun investigating Austin in September. According to an affidavit filed in the case, Austin admitted he had issued himself payroll checks from the company where he had been working as a payroll specialist since 2005.
Austin told police he was having financial problems and faced with credit card debt, but said that after he took a couple of hundred dollars in 2006, he "never really got ahead financially and … kept having to take small amounts to make ends meet."
NSK officials learned of the problem when Austin was unable to meet a request for $400 in petty cash from a box he managed which was supposed to contain about $3,000.
Police said NSK employees reported that Austin was the only one who had access to computer payroll files that he used to issue himself extra payroll checks.
Austin, who does not have a criminal record, could have been sentenced to as much as 20 years in prison because of the charges.
Under the sentence imposed by Judge John Wesley, Austin was scheduled to serve two to four years on each charge but all of the time was suspended except 45 days. Austin was also ordered to perform 100 hours of community service.
The judge ordered Austin to report to the Rutland jail on June 27.
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