WASHINGTON - Jacqueline Cecilia Wright was sentenced this morning to 15 months of incarceration for her scheme to embezzle more than $180,000 from her former employer, the District of Columbia's Office of Tax and Revenue ("OTR"), announced U.S. Attorney Jeffrey A. Taylor, Joseph Persichini, Jr., Assistant Director in Charge of the FBI's Washington Field Office, Charles J. Willoughby, Inspector General for the District of Columbia, and District of Columbia Chief Financial Officer Natwar M. Gandhi.

Wright, 41, of Washington, D.C., was sentenced in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia by the Honorable James Robertson. At the conclusion of her incarceration, Wright will be placed on three years of supervised release. She was also ordered to pay $184,021.03 in restitution to the District of Columbia.

According to the factual proffer presented by the government, beginning in December 2006, Wright used her position as a revenue officer for OTR and her knowledge of an OTR computer program to generate fraudulent income tax refunds for her boyfriend, Michael Clark. Wright assisted Clark in submitting a fraudulent income tax return. After an income tax return check was mailed to Clark, and deposited into his account, Wright altered OTR computer records to make it appear as though the check had not been received. As a result, a new income tax return check was generated and mailed to Clark. Wright repeated this process several times, allowing her and Clark to share the proceeds of six fraudulently obtained D.C. income tax return checks totaling $184,021.03.

"This sentence of incarceration sends an appropriate message of deterrence to our public servants, and it upholds the needs and values of our citizens, whose taxes pay the salaries of government employees," said U.S. Attorney Taylor.

Wright's co-conspirator, Michael Clark, 32, of District Heights, Maryland, previously pled guilty to mail fraud and has been sentenced for his role in the scheme. This investigation was separate and apart from the long-running OTR property tax refund fraud scheme in which eleven defendants, including Harriette Walters, have pled guilty.

In announcing today's sentence, U.S. Attorney Taylor, FBI Assistant Director in Charge Persichini, District of Columbia Inspector General Willoughby, and District of Columbia Chief Financial Officer Gandhi commended FBI Special Agents Andrew Sekela and Mary Gleason; Director of Internal Security Charles Fultz and Senior Investigator Donna Tolliver, both of the Office of the Chief Financial Officer, Office of Integrity and Oversight; and District of Columbia OIG Special Agent Thomas Gibson. They also commended Paralegal Specialist Diane Hayes and Legal Assistant April Peeler. Finally, they commended Assistant U.S. Attorneys Timothy G. Lynch and David S. Johnson, who prosecuted the case.