Two of three former employees have been sentenced forparticipating in a scheme that embezzled more than $61,000 from the $65 millionValley Credit Union in Tuscumbia, Ala.

Tonya M. Payne was sentenced to two years' probation on onecount of bank larceny at U.S District Court in Florence, Ala., onSept. 6. She was employed at the credit union as an accountingclerk, according to court records. On Aug. 30, Stacey Marie Mathes,also was placed on two years of probation on one count of banklarceny. She worked at the cooperative as a loan officer.

Beth Ann Ledbetter, a former branch manager, is scheduledto be sentenced Oct. 22 on one count of bank larceny.

The three employees pleaded guilty earlier for their involvementin the embezzlement scheme. They also paid full restitution of$61,666 to Valley CU in September 2012, court documents show.

Between Aug. 1, 2001 and Aug. 12, 2012, Payne, Mathes andLedbetter wrote checks from their checking accounts to makepayments on their credit union loan accounts, but the checks werenever posted or cleared, according to court documents.

On other occasions, no checks were written, presented orcleared, yet the employees still had payments credited to theirValley CU loan accounts, the documents showed.

The credits to Payne's, Mathes' and Ledbetter's loan accountswere covered by other Valley CU members' account deposits. Courtpapers state the other members' deposits were held before beingpresented to Valley CU's money market account at First Metro Bank.However, other members' deposits were posted to their accountswithout delay.

According to court documents, Valley CU deposits to its moneymarket account at First Metro Bank were not made on a daily basisand the sporadic nature of the deposits facilitated the wrongfulposting of the checks. There was no loss to other members'accounts, but the loss affected Valley CU's money market account at First MetroBank, court records show.