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Woman ordered to pay back money taken from sick friend’s account

WAILUKU — A Wailuku woman was ordered to repay money or face incarceration after she was arrested for stealing from a friend’s bank account when he was flown to Oahu for emergency surgery.

Samantha Kepoo had her sentencing delayed from last week until March 9 to give her time to repay the more than $1,000 stolen last year.

“You are going to be given an opportunity to make this right,” 2nd Circuit Judge Peter Cahill told Kepoo. “I don’t know why a 28-year-old is not working. You need to go out and get a job. This money needs to be paid back.”

Kepoo had pleaded no contest to second-degree theft.

Her friend told police he gave his bank debit card and personal identification number to Kepoo on May 18 before he was flown to Oahu for the surgery to have his leg amputated. She was supposed to give the card and number to his aunt to pay bills.

He was recovering in the hospital when he learned his aunt hadn’t received the debit card. When he was back on Maui on June 4, the man learned 17 transactions, including purchases and cash withdrawals, had been made with the card.

Deputy Public Defender Heather Brown said it was the first criminal case for Kepoo, who “is extremely involved in her church.”

By losing the victim’s friendship, “she has already suffered a pretty big personal penalty,” Brown said.

“She’s also lost a lot of friends and family members due to being involved in this case,” Brown said.

Deputy Prosecutor Kenton Werk said the victim experienced a “deep sense of betrayal from someone he trusted.”

“She has not acknowledged what she did was wrong,” Werk said.

In court Thursday, Cahill read a letter from the victim, who had asked that it be read aloud.

The letter said Kepoo stole the victim’s monthly disability income.

“I really feel sorry for you,” the letter said. “We could have been friends for life, and I stand beside my friends. I am in shock that I misjudged you, thought you would be trustworthy. . . . I know you had stolen from others but thought you would never do this to me.”

The victim said he was recovering from surgery when he learned that only $11 was left in his bank account. He said he had to move with his aunt into a handicapped unit.

Before the stealing, the victim said he had helped buy gas and cigarettes for Kepoo. “I brought you home to eat, and many times you slept over,” his letter said. “You practically lived with us.”

He said Kepoo wrongly “made me out to be the bad person” in Facebook posts.

“You have a problem, and I’m not sure if jail will fix it, but I hope it does,” the letter said.

In her letter to the court, which the judge also read, Kepoo apologized to the victim “for anything I have done to hurt you in any way, shape or form.”

Her letter also said, “I have an open heart to help those in need and I have always been that way since I was a child.”

By writing that, “you are lying to yourself and to your friends,” Cahill told Kepoo.

Referring to the victim, Cahill said: “This is a person in dire need, in dire straits. He was a friend.”

Cahill referred to a New Testament passage saying “who amongst us if we’re asked by a person to give them a loaf of bread would give them a stone.”

“We’ve found the person amongst us who will give the person who asked for a loaf of bread a stone,” Cahill said to Kepoo. “That’s what you did, gave this person a stone.”

With her sentencing delayed, it would give Kepoo time to repay the $1,130, Cahill said.

“In the next 60 days, you’re going to get a job,” the judge told Kepoo. “Otherwise, you’re going to have to go to jail. Because this is just one of the worst, most horrible situations imaginable.”

If the victim hadn’t said in his letter that he had forgiven Kepoo, Cahill said he already would have sentenced her to jail. “That’s how bad I think this was,” Cahill said. “This was just of an extreme nature that can’t ever be tolerated.”

* Lila Fujimoto can be reached at lfujimoto@mauinews.com.

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