A Texas woman, Ketia Irakoze, 20, has been charged with defrauding the Community Action Partnership of Lancaster County, a social services organization in Pennsylvania, out of nearly $30,000. Irakoze allegedly hacked an employee's email account and used it to send fraudulent invoices to the organization's finance department.
According to Lancaster City Police, the Chief Financial Officer for the company discovered a $29,800 payment that was made to a fraudulent company after an employee’s email was hacked. Bank records and surveillance video from the bank captured Irakoze withdrawing $10,000 from the account a day after the payment went through.
LancasterOnline reports that Irakoze posed as the CEO of the Community Action Partnership, Vanessa Philbert, to submit two fraudulent invoices to the organization's vice president of finance, Francine Childs. The fraud was discovered when Childs contacted Philbert to confirm the payment and was informed that neither request came from the chief executive.
Irakoze faces multiple felony charges of forgery, theft, unlawful use of a computer, unlawful transmission of electronic mail, computer trespass, and criminal use of a communication facility. The police have obtained an extradition warrant for Irakoze, who was not in custody at the time of reporting.