Fake IRS agent ordered to pay hotel $55,000

[April 22, 2010]  NOVATO, Calif. (AP) -- A woman accused of accruing thousands of dollars in bills at a Marin County hotel while pretending to be an IRS agent has been sentenced to five years probation and ordered to pay $55,000 to the hotel owners.

Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker in San Francisco sentenced Sherry Lynn Vertoch on Tuesday.

Vertoch pleaded guilty in February to impersonating a federal officer.

Authorities said the woman, who is in her 60s, stopped paying her bills at the Inn Marin in Novato in 2008, telling one of the hotel's owners she was a contract worker with the IRS and wouldn't be paid until she finished an investigation for the agency.

She allegedly urged the owners to write a letter to the IRS when they periodically sought payment.

Prosecutors had recommended probation for Vertoch over prison time.

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Information from: San Francisco Chronicle, http://www.sfgate.com/chronicle/

[Associated Press]

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