A nun, Sister Marie Thornton, who stole NZ$1.1m from a US college has been spared three years prison by a compassionate judge.
The trusted financial officer of Iona College, New Rochelle was sentenced to 2,000 hours community work and a life of shame after losing NZ$1.1m she stole from the college and used to play one-armed bandit machines.
In pleading guilty, Judge Kimba Wood effectively sentenced Thornton to solitary confinement in a small dorm-like room inside the Sisters of St Joseph’s Philadelphia convent.
The 65-year-old nun has served the order for 48 years, but now does not eat with the sisters, nor is she permitted to work inside the Mother house doing small clerical jobs or even weeding the garden.
She is not allowed to leave the convent to visit relatives or friends or be seen in public at all. Her only escapes are trips to her therapist and group counselling.
She can’t even go to the store and get milk, and it’s been reported by a source close to the case she will never be allowed to have contact with people again.
The high-rolling Sister holds a doctorate in education, served as an elementary-school principal and later as an assistant school superintendent for the Archdiocese of Newark.
Thornton’s bad habit lasted for around 10 years, and reportedly normally gambled NZ$2,500 – NZ$6,500 a visit to the cassino.
She used the college corporate credit card for chips and covered up the thousands she would lose by systematically submitting false vendor invoices for reimbursement to Iona College and submitting credit-card bills for personal expenses to be paid by Iona College.
Wearing a Celtic cross necklace, Thornton confessed that the past 2 1/2 years at the convent since her crime was uncovered “have been long, in isolation, in pain and in shame, and in humiliation that I can’t even begin to describe.”
Source: NY Post