A Louisiana woman found herself in hot water after she decided not to return a whopping $1,200,000 that mistakenly ended up in her bank account.
Imagine suddenly finding that kind of money in your balance—tempting, right? However, returning it is undoubtedly the noble course of action.
But Kelyn Spadoni, a 911 dispatcher from Louisiana, wasn’t persuaded to part with the cash after it was accidentally wired into her brokerage account in 2021.
The unexpected deposit was from Charles Schwab, a financial services company. They had recently upgraded their asset transfer software when they intended to send just $82.56 to Spadoni’s new account, but instead sent over a million dollars.
Realizing their mistake, Charles Schwab’s team tried to reverse the transaction immediately.
Unfortunately, when they attempted to recover the funds, they hit a wall with the notification: “CASH NOT AVAILABLE”.
Allegedly, Spadoni had swiftly transferred the funds to another account and used some to purchase a new home and a car valued between $48,000 and $70,000.
“She secreted it, and they were not able to access it,” explained Captain Jason Rivarde of the Sheriff’s office.
After several unsuccessful attempts to contact Spadoni, Charles Schwab turned to the authorities for help. This led to a criminal investigation where it was discovered how she had spent some of the money.
She was subsequently arrested and faced charges of theft over $25,000, bank fraud, and illegal transmission of monetary funds.
Although the charges against Spadoni were eventually dropped, she didn’t completely escape consequences as she was fired from her job and required to complete an ‘adult diversion’ program.
Charles Schwab was able to recover about 75 percent of the money, thanks to the combined efforts of detectives and their legal team.
“If someone accidentally puts an extra zero on a utility payment, they would want that money returned or credited to them. This is no different,” Rivarde noted, highlighting the importance of honesty in such situations.
Pete Greenley, a spokesman for Charles Schwab, expressed his gratitude in 2022: “We are grateful to the authorities who were able to recover most of the assets that the defendant unlawfully acquired.”