A former Dallas County Sheriff’s Office supervisor was sentenced on Monday to nearly three years in prison for embezzling more than $250,000 from the Lew Sterrett Justice Center’s inmate property fund.
Umeka Myers, 50, pleaded guilty to theft from a program receiving federal funds in June 2022. She was sentenced to 33 months in prison and will be required to pay $429,640.66 in restitution, according to a press release from the United States Attorney’s Office.
Myers worked as a supervisor at the inmate property vault, which refunds account balances to inmates via debit cards when released. If an account has more than $30 upon an inmate’s release, the inmate receives a debit card issued by the Keefe Group.
As a supervisor, Myers had the ability to override any errors that occurred during the processing of the debit cards.
Myers would override errors and use book-in numbers from released inmates to create new, duplicate debit cards loaded with the same amount of funds.
She issued dozens of duplicate cards between 2018 and 2021, which she subsequently used in Texas, Louisiana, Nevada, Maryland, and New York.
Dallas FBI Special Agent in Charge Chad Yarbrough said Myers’ actions were selfish and unfair to taxpayers.
“For three years, Ms. Myers callously took advantage of a program receiving federal funds to support her personal bank account. Further, as a supervisor in a government role, she also selfishly risked damaging the credibility of hard-working civil servants that support our county infrastructure,” said Yarbrough, per the press release. “I commend our colleagues at Dallas County for their full cooperation in rooting out greed and corruption in programs that are funded by taxpayer monies.”
Myers has been ordered to report to prison and begin her sentence on September 11.
Crime has been a continuous issue in Dallas, even white-collar crimes such as Myers’.
Dallas’ crime analytics dashboard shows 63 reported cases of embezzlement within the first four months of the year. Meanwhile, fraud, a similar offense, saw a year-over-year increase of roughly 5.29% in that period, recording a massive 796 cases. Detailed statistics for more recent months have been pronounced “unreliable” by the City due to an alleged ransomware attack.
The investigation of such crimes may pose a challenge to the Dallas Police Department, which currently employs only roughly 3,100 officers, many fewer than the 4,000 estimated necessary to fully staff the department.