San Jose, California - Lena “Mickey” Jacobs Coombs was sentenced last week to 36 months in prison on wire fraud charges related to her embezzlement of money from her former employer, Symantec, announced United States Attorney Melinda Haag and FBI Special Agent in Charge David J. Johnson.
Coombs, 48, of Highland, Utah, pleaded guilty on December 16, 2014, to one count of wire fraud. From January 2010 through April 2012, she was employed by Symantec as a Director of Marketing and worked at Symantec’s Lindon, Utah facility outside of Salt Lake City. Coombs admitted in her plea agreement that between January 2010 and May 2012, she used various methods to embezzle a total of over $1.137 million from Symantec. For example, Coombs charged personal and other unauthorized expenses on Symantec American Express Cards and then knowingly submitted fraudulent expense reports to disguise these charges as legitimate business expenses. Coombs also submitted fraudulent invoices falsely claiming that a shell company she had created had done marketing work for Symantec. Coombs then diverted the payments on those fraudulent invoices for her personal use. Coombs further admitted that she spent these embezzled Symantec funds on various personal expenses such as such as trips to Hawaii and the 2012 Super Bowl in Indianapolis, concerts, a home remodel, automobile payments, and a personal nanny. Coombs was indicted by a federal grand jury on June 11, 2014, on wire fraud and money laundering charges in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1343 and 18 U.S.C. § 1957(a).
The sentence was handed down by the Honorable Lucy H. Koh, U.S. District Judge, following a guilty plea of one count of wire fraud. Judge Koh also sentenced Coombs to serve a three-year period of supervised release and ordered her to pay restitution in the amount of $915,412.71. Judge Koh ordered Coombs to self-surrender by July 6, 2015, at which time the defendant will begin serving her sentence.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Joseph Fazioli is prosecuting the case with the assistance of Laurie Worthen. The prosecution is the result of an investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
