Former office manager of Dartmouth College student paper gets 15-month sentence for stealing $223K

CONCORD, N.H. (AP) — The former office manager of Dartmouth College’s student newspaper has been sentenced to 15 months in federal prison for stealing over $223,000 from the paper over four years.

Nicole Chambers, 41, who was sentenced in federal court in Concord, New Hampshire, on Monday, also faces three years of supervised release and has to pay back the money. She pleaded guilty to one count of wire fraud in April.

Chambers was the office manager for The Dartmouth, the college’s primary newspaper, from 2012 to 2021. It is a nonprofit run by student volunteers and earns its money through advertising, alumni donations and investment income, according to court documents.

Prosecutors said Chambers had full access to The Dartmouth’s bank account, PayPal and Venmo accounts, and debit card.

They said Chambers stole money from the paper between 2017 and 2021, making unauthorized transfers from its accounts to others she controlled. She paid for personal expenses, including plane tickets, hotels, a mattress. She also used some money to pay for legal fees for her husband.

Chambers resigned as office manager in September 2021.

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“This was a crime motivated by the defendant’s greed, plain and simple,” U.S. Attorney Jane Young said in a statement. “The defendant stole to fund her high lifestyle, including trips across the United States and Caribbean and purchasing luxury items.”

Chambers took advantage of the students and made a mess of the paper’s finances, former students who worked for The Dartmouth said.

“Nicole’s fraud, which weakened The Dartmouth, thus made victims of the community the newspaper serves,” former Editor-in-Chief Kyle Khan-Mullins said in his statement, the paper reported.

Chambers’ lawyer, Jaye Rancourt, asked for a six-month home confinement sentence, followed by three years of probation. She said that would have allowed for Chambers to continue to seek work, enabling her to pay restitution.

Rancourt also noted that Chambers had no prior criminal record and had suffered from untreated mental health issues at the time. She read a statement by Chambers in court expressing the “deepest remorse” for her actions.