Is it any of your business if she has gone to prison??

has sherry gone to prison yet?

May the Lord bless you and keep you under His wings. May His light shine upon you and give you peace. May His healing hands touch your heart and heal the hate you have inside. Christ forgives and forget. Are you a big enough person to do the same? If not, than you have a bigger problem than Sherry Houpt. She knows she did wrong and the paper said she asked for forgiveness. We will pray for you. You are not hurting anyone but yourself. As someone else said "GET A LIFE."

Mathematician

To the last comment...if you can READ and UNDERSTAND the above article it says Mrs. Houpt stole over a period of 15 years so that would mean only 2,734.57 a month not the 16,000 that you stated. Get your FACTS and MATH straight before you write something on the blog section of any paper!

I wonder if Sherry thought about her family, did she think about her co workers, or friends whose lives she would impact. Did she worry about the people that she stole from, or the bank that gave her a job for 25 years. Apparently all she thought about was getting a great attorney that would make her a sweetheart deal. And what a deal she got, how many people make $16,000 a month? $16,000 x 30 months will equal what she STOLE. Not a bad months pay.

I wonder if Sherry thought about her family, did she think about her co workers, or friends whose lives she would impact. Did she worry about the people that she stole from, or the bank that gave her a job for 25 years. Apparently all she thought about was getting a great attorney that would make her a sweetheart deal. And what a deal she got, how many people make $16,000 a month? $16,000 x 30 months will equal what she STOLE. Not a bad months pay.

Freedom of Speech. Don't read the comments if they are offensive to you.

Could all of you just stop all of your comments about Mrs. Houpt and think of her family and what all of this is doing to them. Their hearts are breaking. They are losing a wife, mother,daughter and sister for 30 months. Her mother is in bad health. You have stepped on enough toes and hearts. Mrs. Houpt will do what the judge has ordered. If you do not agree with that, keep your comments to yourself. Think of someone besides yourself.

We have a life because we aren't sitting in jail for stealing.

GET A LIFE PEOPLE

ST

I cannot imagine in my wildest dreams how Sherry Houpt got off with such a light sentence for this FEDERAL crime..I worked with her and was there when this happened..this whole situation put a dark cloud over that branch and the employees lives that were involved. She was a master trickster...we all loved her and trusted her..including our branch manager and her CLIENTS. So, to see that she got off with a mere slap on the wrist is disheartening and shakes my faith in the judicial system.

Why would anyone feel sorry for Sherry? She knew what she was doing. She admitted to eating at restuarants with her family and shopping. Hope she thinks about the "good times" while she is sitting in jail. I feel sorry for the customers she took money from and the employees who got fired because of her wrong doing.

I feel bad for the teller - I'm sure she regrets what she did. 30 months does not sound like a long time, but the days get very long sitting in jail day after day for 2.5 years. It's a long time to be away from your family. Nobody won in this situation.

the branch manager didnt find the shortage. the shortage....bank shipment...was found by the back office in Atlanta. It should have been found by branch staff under CCB when they did the monthly branch counts of ALL cash in the branch. There were several managers over Sherry.....all were suppose to be doing cash count each and every month. Not sure how they didnt pick up on this if they were counting the cash other than the fact that houpt was manipulating the g/l. Where was accounting in all this? They eveidently WERE not balancing the G/L or they would have found it many many years ago.......

Exactly - he found what he COULD, and because of this he got fired. The other stuff he had no way of finding.

If they branch manager COULD and DID find the $50,000 missing from the vault in March of 2007 then why in the world was he fired by Suntrust in June of 2007. It doesn't make sense to fire someone for discovering the theft and reporting it to his superiors and then getting fired. He was being honest and doing his job and for what? He got FIRED!!!

I would like to respond / piggyback on what J.S. just said - as a banker in another city, I agree that upper management should be 100% involved in the daily dealings of the vault and its contents. That is why banks have very specific and strict audit procedures in place. However, my pals at ST say that this article does not tell the entire story -for most of the 15 years, she manipulated General Ledger accounts - debiting various accts and pocketing the money. Now, I've been in branch banking for many years, and nowhere in my job description does it say I am supposed to reconcile GL accounts - that's why we have an ACCOUNTING department. So, from what I can tell, the bank's accounting area didn't see anything wrong with the debits coming from the office. Even the best branch manager would have no way of knowing about this. The other "essential" piece that this article does not mention is that Houpt also stole $$ from customer's accounts (most of whom were older clients). Unless the clients alert the bank that money is missing from their accounts (which they did not for), no manager would have any way of knowing that this was happening. Was the manager an omnipresent mind reader? I doubt it. The $50,000 missing from the vault in March 2007 referenced above WAS found during a routine audit of the vault, something that the manager COULD and DID discover. I do have a question if anyone can answer it - what happens if she cannot pay the restitution?

J.S.

As vault teller, she reported to the branch manager. Keziah said that "absolutely" her position made it possible to remove the money. "Nobody would go back behind her," he said. I have a friend that works in another bank as a vault teller in Charleston, and another friend that manages a bank in Lexington. They both were shocked that any bank could be this irresponsible. Both also told me that for something like that to even happen a lot of federal rules and regs would have to be ignored by management. I wish I would have been in court to see the look on the judge's face, to have a REGIONAL SECURITY COORDINATOR tell a judge "Nobody would go behind her". Especially when "her" is an employee that (if paid similarly to my friend) is an HOURLY employee making under $15/hour. Those who question the judge about the lightness of the sentence should think about that. Furthermore, if he stated that this is common practice, and I was in a position of authority, I would fire Mr. Keziah. I don't know about the current manager being fired, but without question any previous manager should be fired. With all of the federal checks and audits that must happen, for this to occur SOMEONE had to not be doing there job. Why is a regional security manager even AT a sentencing hearing? Is that normal? Or did he say that in a previous hearing? I suppose the defense could have called him? Smart defense lawyer if he called him to testify. Mrs. Houpt surely was in the wrong, but how many of you would leave your checkbook/wallets on the hood of your car at night, every night, and not count the money in the wallet every morning? How could a BANK, whose commodity is MONEY, not notice so much money gone... that's $20,000+ per year for 15+ years! That's like having a second job (judging by my vault teller friend's salary). To those seeing the manager's as innocent: I'm sorry, but in my work and business dealings I have to be responsible. They are innocent of intentional wrongdoing, but they are poor managers. Ask any bartender if they know how many bottles of Gin they have in stock, or how many bottles of beer they have left. Ask any small business owner how much "x commodity" he has left and he will be able to tell you. She should have been caught within a year of her first theft. If she had been a teller 8 years BEFORE stealing, she must have known someone wasn't doing something. If she'd been caught then, she would've gotten a fine, restitution, and probably parole but have learned her lesson, and taxpayers wouldn't be on the hook for the FDIC insurance the bank probably collected. If she had went in and robbed the bank, or walked out with a duffel bag full of money my feelings would be very different, but I am simply shocked that a bank could have an employee stealing $20,000+ per year for a year without catching them, let alone ***17*** years. "According to court records, Houpt began by taking only small amounts of money and kept records to make it appear the money was still in the vault." Unbelievable that a bank never checks the money. Wow.

You do not know what you are talking about. How many Branch Managers actually go into the vault and count each dollar every week, that is the auditors job and the job of the many accountants that work in Atlanta, Richmond, Orlando. Alot of the missing money occurred in GL debits and credits and not hard cold cash. Anyway SunTrust has made it their mission to work as few persons as possible to do more work than they can in a 40 hour week. Here in lies some of the problem, reduce staff and increase expectations and oh yeah during your lunch break pull a Teller off the line and count the vault every day. No wonder this stock is dropping like a rock. Don't you think if there was someone else in on it Sherry would have sung that song by now. Plus She worked for many different Branch Managers, not the same one for 15 years. To the blogger above you; They all did not get what thet deserved, especially Sherry. SunTrust did not uncover this mess, two of those fired uncovered it. As far as the restitution, how far is $200 a month going to go to payback nearly %500,000. Lets see that will take 2500 months or 208 years. Don't think she will live that long.

The four others fired shouldn't be serving time because they are innocent. She did this all on her own. So stop blaming others.

Innocent people do get fired and DID get fired.

jeepers, get your facts straight. Suntrust uncovered this mess, not CCB nor any of the other formerly named banks (CCB, Security, etc.). Houpt was good at stealing. The branch manager was not on top of the thefts, neither was the auditor. They got fired. That's the way it is in ANY bank, not just Suntrust. Poop runs downhill. they all got what they deserved. Suntrust is not a bad bank for firing the bad bank robber nor the people ALSO responsible to watch the money and make sure it stays protected. Sherry Houpt said she's sorry, will serve her time, make restitution. That was the judge's decision. Leave it at that.

Innocent people don"t get fired.The branch manager is responsible for what goes on in his bank. He has to initial vault orders. Tellers also answer to him. How many audits occurred in 15 years? How many times did the bank change names in 15 years? It sounds like the teller in question is not the only one in fault. Why was the teller the only bold one to admit she made a mistake? Who is she taking the wrap for??? If 4 others were fired, should they be serving time? Sweep trash from your on door before you sweep it from someone else.

If u bank at suntrust u need to run as fast as u can and find another bank

I am so glad that all of this is out in the open. I personally know one of the fired employees and their life is much better now in their new job.This person has been very professional during the entire ordeal and should be proud of the manner in which they handled this fiasco.

Mike

I hear countless stories from their current and former employees of the crap they put people through. And to fire people for this incident who had nothing to do with it is the icing on the cake. I hope this woman sits in prison for the entire sentence for what she did, but I also hope people will stop banking with this ridiculous place.

Sherry worked for the bank for 25 years.

Mary

You know, its a really good thing Suntrust doesn't run the Police Department! I don't think they'd catch many criminals, since according to them that is something you should be punished for! Totally ridiculous.

Yes, the person/people who discovered her terrible crimes SHOULD have been rewarded, just like they reward tellers for giving out the dye pack during a robbery. That's exactly what this was - a calculated, deliberate bank robbery that was executed over several years. Unfortunately, the person/people who stopped the robbery were, in fact, terminated. How's that for company loyalty? This teaches others to turn a blind eye and keep their mouths shut - GREAT lesson for your employees, SunTrust.

No, I don't mean fired. That person should have been given credit by Suntrust and recognized for being on top of things and doing an excellent job at the bank. Which by the way had not been done for the past 15 years that she was employed there. It wasn't right that any of the people lost their jobs and had to start a new life because of something they had no knowledge of or anything to do with.

If by rewarded, you meen fired, with no severance package and escorted out of the bulding within an hour, than, yes they were rewarded for doing their job.

The person responsible for discovering this crime and reporting it should be rewarded for catching a "bank robber."

Yes, the four who got fired were the "sacrificial lambs" for the Regional Presidents. It's a bunch of junk.

4 employees lost their jobs because former managers, auditors and back room number crunchers were not able to balance GL accounts. The persons fired happened to be in management and responsibility rolls at the time the occurence was caught. They had not been there for the 15 years this was going on, just when she got caught. And SunTrust Bank in their infinite wisdom had to fire them to show that they had taken care of the problem so that higher level Presidents could say they were doing their job. This Bank is a horrible place to work. As soon as I can find another job I am out of here. I do not know why anyone would bank there either?

I was curious as to how this could go on as long as this did. was there not any checks and balances going on. It seems as though as many times as Sun Trust,CCB, OmniBank, and going all the way to Security Bank changed ownership there would be auditors going over the books before each sale. Sounds like the employee was guilty will be going to prison but does it take 15 yrs. to find out something is going on out of the ordinary.

Billy

How do you spend close to $500,000 on "restaurants and shopping?" The "restitution" should be paid to the innocent employees.

I have no respect for Suntrust and will not be banking with them anymore.

The newspaper account didn't say 4 tellers. But families and friends of those innocent people who were fired because of her greed know all about the pain and suffering they had to endure because of her. She needs to ask for their forgiveness!

This sentence is a drop in the bucket compared to the harm that Houpt has caused...she deliberately manipulated coworkers, clients and others for YEARS for her own personal gain. Other posts have mentioned that four others lost their jobs because of her?? What??!! What is the story with that? Innocent people had to suffer because of HER SELFISHNESS??

Houpt worked as a bank teller at four Salisbury branches. In March 2007, a bank operations section of SunTrust noticed that a $50,000 incoming cash shipment to the vault at Houpt's 2070 Statesville Blvd. branch was missing. ASK SUNTRUST WHY THE NEW BRANCH MANAGER THAT DISCOVERED WHAT HAD BEEN GOING ON FOR YEARS WAS ALSO FIRED FOR NO REASON, ALMOST IMMEDIATELY AFTER REPORTING TO HIGHER UPS THE MISSING MONEY . SOMEBODY ELSE HIGHER UP MUST HAVE HAD SOMETHING TO HIDE. GOT ANY INVESTIGATED REPORTERS?

Where did it say anything about 4 other tellers??? Did you all go to court on Friday?? Why were you there unless you were one of the tellers?

I wonder how fair the 4 innocent employees who lost their jobs over houpts dishonesty feel about this sentence? Doesnt seem severe enough to me....

i wonder how the trusting customers she stole from....and the four employees who lost their jobs feelk about the sentence????

Lynn

Stupid and greedy. That is a LOT of money.

She is sorry because she got caught, not for the crimes she committed.

talk about a slap on the hand should have goten ayear for every year she stole and what about aid and abetting by family and friendsor did they think she was the CEO

Serving 30 months for a crime spree that lasted 180 months? It just does not seem fair. The story did not go into details of the lives that were affected by this crime.

If she wants to be forthright, then an apology to those people who lost their jobs because of her greed would be appropriate.

Sherry's greed caused many innocent people and their families to suffer.