In a recently unsealed grand jury indictment, a former First Financial Bank, Winnebago, employee, Maggie Kay Hassing, was charged with one count of embezzlement by a bank employee.

According to the indictment released in United States District Court, District of Minnesota, in St. Paul, Hassing is being accused of embezzling approximately $372,000 from 43 different customer accounts from approximately January of 2018 to September of 2023.

The indictment states that Hassing allegedly devised a scheme to fraudulently duplicate customers’ cash withdrawal tickets and steal money from their accounts.

It goes on to state when Hassing received a cash withdrawal ticket from a customer, she frequently scanned the ticket a second time after processing the customer’s legitimate transaction.

The additional tickets did not have the customer’s signature and were done without the customer’s authorization, the indictment states. It goes on to state Hassing then took the cash that she had taken and, at times, deposited it into her own account at First Financial.

The indictment states she is accused if doing approximately 1,125 fraudulently duplicated withdrawal transactions which totaled approximately $372,000.

First Financial contacted the Faribault County Register to make it clear that as of May 1, all of the customers who had lost money in this case had been reimbursed with interest from the day that particular theft had occurred.

“About 99 percent of our customers were not affected by this,” First Financial Bank president Bill Erickson said. “We want to say thank you to all of our customers for their support of us and those who assisted us in this case.”

Hassing has already appeared in court and has been released on a $25,000 bond and was ordered to follow a long list of conditions for her release.

Her next court appearance is an arraignment and motion hearing set for July 19 at 2 p.m. in Courtroom 8E in Minneapolis before Magistrate Judge Dulce J. Foster. Hassing’s attorney is Caitlinrose H. Fisher.