Imagine waking up one day and checking on your bank account balance, only to find out that for some unknown reason, you are $120,000 richer. Would you spend that money as soon as possible, or check in with the bank to see what went wrong?
Well if you are anything like this one couple in particular, you will probably be more excited about the former.
A couple located in Pennsylvania is now facing felony theft charges, after exactly that happened to them. Except, instead of contacting the bank, they simply went ahead and spent every single dime.
Robert and Tiffany Williams are also facing overdraft fees from the bank, which clock in at about $107,000, according to the criminal complaint filed in the Lycoming County magisterial district court.
Tiffany shared that the money was spent on an SUV, a camper, two four wheelers and a car trailer, when she was being interviewed by law enforcement. There were other little things bought here and there as well, according to an affidavit.
Bouncing back to the bank error…You are probably wondering how such a big mistake was made by the bank in the first place.
On May 31, when a customer in Georgia made a deposit of $120,000, the BB&T Bank Teller entered the wrong account number. Then, when the customer reached out to the bank about the missing deposit, investigators found that the money already went into Williams’ account.
“While we can’t comment on the specifics of this issue due to client privacy practices, we always work as quickly as possible to address any issue that affects our clients,” Brian Davis, a spokesman for BB&T, told CNN in a statement. “We’re also continuously working to enhance our client service and operating procedures to provide the best client experience possible.”
So yeah, this looks pretty bad for the bank and the fact that they managed to transfer such a large amount of money to the wrong account. However, in their defense, they also reached out in attempt to contact the Williams several times.
When Tiffany was contacted by the bank on June 21, she said “she no longer had the funds because she had already paid off bills,” the affidavit said.
Some of the money went to paying off bills and fixing cars, while $15,000 of it was given to struggling friends who were in need of some extra cash,
Apparently, Tiffany told the bank that she would try to brainstorm a repayment agreement with the bank so that they could get all of that money back, however the bank was unable to contact the couple after that conversation took place via phone call on June 21.
Both Tiffany and Robert told investigators that they very well knew the money did not belong to them.
“All I’m going to say is we took some bad legal advice from some people, and it probably wasn’t the best thing in the end,” Robert Williams told CNN affiliate WNEP outside the court Monday. This is where they made their first appearance during the case.
WNEP reports the couple has been released on $25,000 bail.
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