HOA treasurer stole $230,000 from neighbors, deposited money in her accounts, feds say
A homeowners association treasurer stole more than $230,000 in HOA member fees paid by her neighbors at a retirement community in Utah, according to federal court documents.
Now, she’s been sentenced but avoided prison time recommended by prosecutors after the theft ended at the Lava Bluff mobile home park in Hurricane, about 300 miles southwest of Salt Lake City, court records show.
While treasurer of the Lava Bluff HOA, Sharon Lee Ann Gordon took advantage of her access to the HOA’s bank accounts between 2016 and March 2022, when she drained the accounts of members’ fees “for her personal benefit,” according to federal prosecutors.
Gordon embezzled $232,078 by transferring HOA funds to herself, by forging board members’ signatures, by depositing her neighbors’ member fee checks into her accounts and by withdrawing cash from the HOA accounts, court filings submitted by prosecutors show.
She also wrote checks to herself, to her boyfriend and to casinos from the HOA bank accounts, prosecutors said.
“She exploited a community full of fixed-income retirees attempting to enjoy their hard-earned golden years,” prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memorandum. “She repeatedly stole from her neighbors. Conduct like this affects more than money — it diminishes common bonds of trust…”
When the HOA board detected the theft, a lien was placed on Gordon’s home, according to the sentencing memorandum.
This led to Gordon selling her home and paying the HOA $168,629.68 after she signed a note promising to repay the amount she stole, prosecutors said.
She ultimately pleaded guilty to wire fraud and a false statement on a tax return, court records show.
The sentence
Gordon, who’s now 66 and lives in Hurricane, was sentenced to one year and one day of home detention, followed by three years of probation on April 8, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Utah announced in a news release.
Her defense attorneys, Stephen R. McCaughey and Kristin R. McCaughey, didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment from McClatchy News on April 9.
The four bank accounts Gordon stole from were designated for the Lava Bluff HOA’s street repairs, savings, general operating costs and expenses for the community’s RV lot, according to court documents.
In addition to defrauding the HOA, Gordon was accused of wrongly reporting her income to the IRS from 2017 through 2021, according to prosecutors.
Ahead of sentencing, prosecutors recommended a sentence of one year and three months in federal prison for Gordon as the court considered her “gambling addiction” and her “role as caretaker for her partner.”
In the sentencing memo, prosecutors wrote they had “no intent to diminish Ms. Gordon’s struggle with addiction or her caretaking role” but “those are not bases to reduce the sentence for her serious and harmful conduct.”
As part of her sentence, U.S. District Court Chief Judge Robert J. Shelby ordered Gordon to pay the HOA $63,448.32 in restitution, the amount she still owes, as well as $20,490 in restitution to the IRS, prosecutors said.
“Money that was designated for the community’s management went to line Gordon’s own pockets,” Shohini Sinha, the special agent in charge of the FBI in Salt Lake City, said in the release. “This case should serve as an example that fraud never pays.”
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