A former Lynchburg-spot estate planning lawyer and prosecutor pleaded guilty Friday in federal courtroom to fraudulently wiring money from her aged customers.
Cherie Anne Washburn, 45, of Lynchburg, was charged with 13 whole crimes in the U.S. District Courtroom for the Western District of Virginia in an Oct indictment. In exchange for Washburn’s pleas to two counts of wire fraud and one count of earning a phony assertion to a house loan loan company, prosecutors agreed to drop 10 of the fees against her.
The charges stem from a scheme versus two of her purchasers in which, utilizing Washburn’s entry as their energy of attorney, she wired thousands or tens of countless numbers of pounds at a time in particular transactions for her personal reward, according to courtroom documents.
Prosecutors explained at Washburn’s digital plea listening to Friday that she’d owe close to $233,000 full in restitution, a determine Washburn and her attorney, Paul Beers, disputed.
Washburn been given her law license in 2011, performing initial out of a Roanoke-based mostly civil firm and then as a prosecutor in Appomattox County and then in Campbell County. She remaining Campbell County in June 2015 for private observe in Forest and was named electric power of attorney for 1 of the victims in the situation about five months afterwards, according to court documents.
Indictments submitted from Washburn depth frequent withdrawals and account transfers from two victims commencing in November 2016. Civil situations involving equally victims surfaced in Lynchburg Circuit Court docket in 2018, one particular of them brought on by abnormal account activity seen by Grownup Protecting Expert services staff.