Arkansas woman sentenced to 36 months for stealing from elderly customers

An Arkansas woman was sentenced Thursday in federal court for stealing over $300,000 from elderly customers at a New Hampshire credit union, Acting U.S. Attorney Jay McCormack and U.S. Attorney Jonathan D. Ross announced.

Tyra Brown, 27, of Benton was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Brian S. Miller of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas to 36 months in prison and three years of supervised release. On Jan. 23, 2025, Brown pleaded guilty in the Eastern District of Arkansas to one count of wire fraud.

"The defendant deliberately abused her position of trust and chose to target elderly account holders, knowing some of whom were unfamiliar with electronic banking," said Acting U.S. Attorney McCormack. "The U.S. Attorney's Office and our law enforcement partners are vigilantly working to protect Granite Staters from fraudsters like the defendant."

"Tyra Brown had no compunction about swindling elderly victims out of their hard-earned money. What she did isn't just cowardly, it's cruel," said James Crowley, Acting Special Agent in Charge of the FBI Boston Division. "The FBI will never stop working to shut down elder fraud schemes like this one."

Brown was a customer service representative for a New Hampshire credit union. Because of her job, Brown could access customers' personal identifying information, security questions and answers, and account balances. She was only permitted to access customer account information for business purposes, such as to answer customer questions on calls. Brown used that access to steal $301,674.89 from at least 10 elderly victims and attempted to steal $428,526.85 in total. Brown used wires, electronic debits, and Zelle to transfer victim funds to other accounts.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation in New Hampshire led the investigation. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Alexander S. Chen of the District of New Hampshire and Katie Hinojosa of the Eastern District of Arkansas prosecuted the case.