Ex-credit union manager sentenced to six months

BANGOR – The former manager of the Penobscot County Federal Credit Union was sentenced in U.S. District Court on Tuesday to six months in prison for embezzling $10,417 from the small financial facility.

Judith K. Wilcox, 43, of Milford will serve one month in prison and five under house arrest for embezzling from the Old Town credit union between February 1999 and December 2000. Judge George Singal also sentenced Wilcox to three years probation and ordered her to pay restitution to PCFCU. She must surrender to federal authorities on Feb. 4.

After hearing from employees how Wilcox’s actions destroyed the trust and faith members had in the credit union, Singal called the former manager’s actions “worse than the criminal who robs strangers” because she stole from people who cared about her.

Wilcox, who has no criminal record, pleaded guilty to one count of embezzlement in October.

In other cases before Singal:

. Omar Grace, 44, of Exeter was sentenced to 10 years and 10 months in prison on five charges related to illegal drug trafficking and one count of firearms possession. The woman, whose bail was revoked in August when she failed a drug test, pleaded guilty to the drug charges in October. That same month, she was found guilty on the weapons charge.

Her husband, Donald Grace, 40, was charged as a co-defendant, but skipped bail and remains at large, according to U.S. Attorney Daniel Perry. The couple was arrested in November 2001 at their home, where members of the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency found OxyContin, cocaine and a large amount of cash.

. Jose Reyes, 25, of Lawrence, Mass., was sentenced to 171/2 years in prison for drug trafficking. Reyes, also known as Jonathan Caballero, was arrested in August 2001 in a Bangor motel with two other men. Singal told Reyes that his extensive criminal history increased his sentence significantly over those imposed on his co-defendants, Ronald Idano, 19, of Bangor and Benjamin Cruz, 19, also of Lawrence, Mass.

In August, Cruz was sentenced to seven months in prison and Idano to eight months, with four months to be served under house arrest. Both men received 36 months of probation. Reyes also was sentenced to six years probation.

. Robert Lewis, 31, a transient, was sentenced to 101/2 years and three years probation on federal firearms charges. He was arrested in October 2001 for planning to rob the Norridgewock Pawn Shop and Trading Post at gunpoint. Lewis pleaded guilty to charges last fall.