Former bank branch manager sentenced to 3 years in two fraud schemes

A former manager of a bank branch in Brownsburg has been sentenced to three years in prison for two separate fraud schemes—one involving bank customers and the other involving three children for whom she served as inheritance trustee.

Between the two scheme, Susan Fruits, 46, of Avon admitted to stealing more than $315,000, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office of Southern Indiana.

Fruits also was sentenced to serve two years of supervised release and was ordered to pay more than $315,000 in restitution.

According to federal officials, Fruits admitted in court that between 2017 and 2020 she withdrew money from bank customers’ certificate of deposit accounts without their knowledge.

She digitally signed for the customers without their authorization and then approved the withdrawals using her position as branch manager. In total, she stole more than $180,000 from the bank’s customers through the scheme.

In the other scheme, Fruits had become trustee for the inheritance accounts of three children whose mother had died. Each account contained more than $50,000.

Over the course of eight months, Fruits spent all the money in the children’s accounts on unauthorized purchases, federal officials said. To conceal her thefts, she created and mailed false bank statements showing that the children’s accounts still had thousands of dollars in them.

“Ms. Fruits’ actions were full of greed and selfishness,” said Acting U.S. Attorney John E. Childress in a media release. “It is sad to see someone abuse a position of trust for self-enrichment, especially at the cost of children who have already lost so much.”

Fruits pleaded guilty to bank and mail fraud in July.