Kristina Young Pleads Guilty to Identity Theft

Kristina Alysse Young was sentenced Thursday to 39 months in federal prison for fraud, identity theft and conspiracy, after pleading guilty to the offenses in March. Young, and two other women who had previously pleaded guilty, were accused of stealing mail and altering checks, which they tried to cash at stores in the San Joaquin County area of California.^[1]

According to Assistant United States Attorney Michelle Rodriguez, who was prosecuting the case, Young was convicted for her participation in a conspiracy to commit bank fraud with checks and financial information stolen from vehicles and U.S. Mail boxes.^[2] Young had been charged with forging identification cards in order to pose as other people, so that she could pose as payees or true account holders in order to cash the stolen and forged checks.^[3]

Young and her conspirators, altered the stolen checks, then forged and attempted to cash the checks to defraud retailers in the San Joaquin County area.^[4] She was convicted of one count of conspiracy, one count of bank fraud, and one count of aggravated identity theft.^[5]

Aggravated Identity Theft
Aggravated identity theft occurs when the crime of identity theft is coupled with another felony, here bank fraud. Under 18 U.S.C. § 1028A, if a person knowingly and unlawfully transfers, possesses, or uses a means of identification of another person in conjunction with the commission of a set list of felonies, that person will be punished as those felonies provide and that person will additionally be imprisoned for 2 years. If the felony happens to be a terrorism offense, that person will receive an additional 5 years of imprisonment.^[6] Furthermore, that person will not be placed on probation, nor will the term of imprisonment run concurrently, unless the court has been given discretion to do by the Sentencing commission.^[7]

---

^[1] Record Staff, ID theft nets woman 39 months, Stockton Record, June 08, 2007, available at http://www.recordnet.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070608/A_NEWS/70607015 (last visited June 9, 2007).
^[2] DOJ News Release, McGregor W. Scott, United States Attorney Eastern District of California, March 1, 2007, available at http://www.usdoj.gov/usao/cae/press_releases/docs/2007/03-01-07YoungPlead.pdf (last visited June 9, 2007).
^[3] Record Staff, supra note 1.
^[4] DOJ Press Release, supra note 2.
^[5] Id.
^[6]18 U.S.C. § 1028A (2007).
^[7] Id.