Woman Gets 18 Months in Northrop Theft Case

A former clerk-typist for a defense contractor’s employee suggestion awards program was herself awarded 18 months in state prison Friday for embezzling $205,000 of the program’s funds.

Sylvia Scott, 28, of Long Beach, pleaded guilty last June to one count of grand theft for making fraudulent awards to co-workers at Northrop Corp. A second count of conspiracy to commit grand theft was dropped as part of a plea bargain.

Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Aurelio Munoz said an additional year of her prison sentence would be stayed as long as Scott shows up next Friday to begin her term. Scott also agreed to return $5,000 to Northrop as partial restitution.

2 Others Plead Guilty

Two other former Northrop employees also entered guilty pleas in the case, and three more are being sought.

Under Northrop’s suggestion program, employees are encouraged to submit ideas that can save the company money. If an idea is accepted, the employee receives an amount equivalent to 10% of the company’s savings in the first year, up to $10,000, company spokesman Terry Clawson said.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Abraham Aponte Khan said Scott had control of the awards payment list. She would type up the names of recipients, obtain checks from the company’s payroll department and send out the checks through interoffice mail.

Names Added to List

Between August, 1979, and her arrest on May 12, 1983, Scott would occasionally add the names of her co-defendants to the awards list, giving them prizes for suggestions that had been rejected, the prosecutor said.

The scheme was uncovered after Northrop officials conducted an audit of the program and noticed that some rejected suggestions were earning prizes, Khan said. The company contacted Hawthorne police, who placed Scott under surveillance.

A detective watched as Scott picked up a batch of award checks and placed all but one in an interoffice mailbox. She put the remaining check in her purse, Police Detective Bob Sanders said in his report.

After pleading guilty last June, Scott “admitted that the whole idea was hers and that she enlisted others to help her,” according to a probation report submitted to the court.

Scott, Khan said, has now received the award she deserves for her idea of “placing names on the awards list that weren’t entitled to any compensation.”

$61,961 in ‘Awards’

Co-defendant Roland Brown, 30, of Los Angeles, was sentenced last October to 28 months in prison. Investigators said he received $61,961 worth of “awards” in 1982 and $19,471 in 1983.

Anthony Howard Sawyer, 29, of Los Angeles, admitted receiving $32,237 in 1982 in amounts ranging from $300 to $8,000. Earlier this month, Judge Ronald Cappai ordered him to spend 90 days in state prison for diagnostic tests to determine if he should remain in prison or be placed on probation.

As a result of the Scott case, Northrop spokesman Clawson said, the company has “instituted a number of internal procedures to ensure this type of manipulation of awards funds will not take place again.”

Paul Feldman contributed to this article.