By Associated Press - Friday, June 5, 2020

GREEN RIVER, Wyo. (AP) - A Wyoming woman has pleaded guilty to stealing about $3,000 from the Sweetwater County Combined Communications Dispatch Center for personal use between 2016 and 2018.

Laura Etienne was arrested in January and charged with felony and misdemeanor counts related to misusing an Amazon Prime account set up for the center, the Rocket-Miner reported.

Etienne originally pleaded not guilty to the felony theft charge in March, but she changed her plea Thursday as part of an agreement with the state of Wyoming.

Etienne was originally charged with theft and unlawful use of credit card and faced up to 10 years in prison and more than $10,000 in restitution.

Judge Richard Lavery accepted the plea Thursday, which includes up to four years in prison, three years of supervised probation and about $3,000 in restitution. Probation will be modified to unsupervised once restitution is fully paid.

Etienne told the court she had no reasonable explanation for using the company credit card. She added that it was saved on her family’s Amazon account.

Her husband was the former director of the dispatch center, but she did not work at the center.

“This is the first time I’ve ever done anything illegal other than parking tickets,” Etienne said, adding that she would never again put herself or her family in such a situation.

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