Metro East Woman gets prison time for ID theft cases
An identity theft case in which a woman bilked elderly women and others has netted the perpetrator 75 months in federal prison.
Tamecia Buckley, 37, of Cahokia, was sentenced Wednesday on seven fraud counts and five aggravated identity theft counts. Buckley pled guilty to the charges in July and has been in federal custody since August 2019. She will serve a three-year term of supervised release following her imprisonment on the fraud counts and a one-year term of supervised release on the aggravated identity theft counts.
Documents in the case reveal that for about a five-year period, Buckley used the identities
of real people, some of whom were elderly females, without their permission to purchase a car,
lease cellular telephones (which she sold for cash), and activate utility services, causing losses over
$325,000. In sentencing Buckley, United States District Judge Staci M. Yandle acknowledged the
emotional harm aggravated identity theft victims experience, stating that many people “don’t
consider how serious it is.”
United States Attorney Steven D. Weinhoeft praised the investigative work of the United States Postal Inspection Service, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Illinois State Police, the Germantown Police Department, the Richmond Heights Police Department, the Fairview Heights Police Department, and the Cahokia Police Department for their work in this investigation.
U.S. Attorney Weinhoeft also acknowledged that in 2018, 14.4 million Americans became
identity theft victims. This averages out to about one out of every 15 Americans or a new victimization every two seconds.”
“If you believe you have been a victim of identity theft, I encourage you to contact your local police department and submit a report,” Weinhoeft said.
