Trio charged with stealing from Lake County village’s bank account

Three out-of-state residents face dozens of charges stemming from the alleged theft of about $700,000 from a Lake County village’s coffers.

The charges follow a more than yearlong investigation by the Winthrop Harbor Police Department, the Lake County state’s attorney’s office, Homeland Security Investigations and multiple other law enforcement agencies, officials announced Wednesday.

Winthrop Harbor police contacted the state’s attorney’s Financial Crimes and Public Integrity Division in February 2024, after village officials reported unauthorized transactions involving the village’s bank account, authorities said.

The transactions, spanning from October 2022 to October 2023, totaled roughly $700,000, officials said. The bank’s fraud department was able to recover and return a significant amount of these funds to the village, authorities said.

With help from a Lake County criminal intelligence analyst and financial analysts from Homeland Security, detectives were able to track transactions, find wire transfers, identify bank accounts linked to the fraudulent activities, and identify multiple suspects in Las Vegas, Nevada, and Memphis, Tennessee.

On Feb. 27, Winthrop Harbor detectives and Memphis police executed search warrants at addresses in Memphis and Jackson, Tennessee, resulting in the arrests of suspects Phillip Sanders and Vanessa Yarbrough and the seizure of evidence, authorities said.

Suspect Patrick Dickens was arrested in Nashville, Tennessee, that same day.

Additional charges are pending against other suspects as the investigation continues, officials said.

Each faces one felony count of theft, continuing financial crimes enterprise, misappropriation of financial institution property, and money laundering.

Sanders and Yarbrough also face one count each of structuring a transaction, and Sanders and Dickens also face one count of computer fraud.