News Photo by Julie Riddle Alpena County Prosecutor Cynthia Muszynski, right, listens at a trial in Alpena’s 26th Circuit Court on Tuesday as fraud analyst Cynthia Scott explains bookkeeping discrepancies she found while investigating financial records in the embezzlement trial of Gena Carstens.

ALPENA — A woman stole more than $100,000 from her brother-in-law and boss, a judge decided on Thursday.

At the conclusion of a three-day bench trial in Alpena’s 26th Circuit Court, Judge Ed Black handed down a guilty verdict for Gena Carstens, accused of dipping her hand into the till of one-time employer Ossineke Building Supply to the tune of $254,000.

Black said financial records proved beyond a reasonable doubt that Carstens, 60, was responsible for about $150,000 recorded as income by the business’s cash registers but never arriving at the bank over a span of several years.

Alpena County Prosecutor Cynthia Muszynski offered evidence via an expert witness that Carstens also rerouted the store’s funds to her husband’s business, took thousands of dollars from the cash drawer without permission, and gave herself two raises.

Through Carstens and other witnesses, defense attorney David Funk offered testimony refuting those accusations, and Black said he couldn’t say Carstens had stolen money in those ways.

Muszynski offered enough evidence, however, to convince the judge Carstens had walked away with at least $100,000 in cash deposits between 2010 and 2018.

Forensic fraud investigator Cynthia Scott testified she found the $150,000 shortage when going through 20-some boxes of daily transactions from Ossineke Building Supply after former co-owner Annette Carstens reported concerns about the business’s finances.

Formerly owned by Annette and Rick Carstens, the once-thriving business took a financial nosedive shortly after Gena Carstens started working there, Annette Carstens testified on Tuesday.

Gena Carstens is married to Marty Carstens, and Marty and Rick Carstens are brothers.

An initial check of the business’s finances led Annette Carstens to evidence that her sister-in-law, then working as the business’s bookkeeper, had stolen $30,000.

Reluctant to fire Gena or report her to police, Annette and Rick Carstens said their sister-in-law could pay the money back, counting church and Bible study attendance as partial payment, Annette Carstens testified.

When the business ultimately failed, its owners $1.2 million in debt, Annette Carstens provided financial records to Scott, who found evidence of larger-scale fraud than was originally suspected.

When a successful business suddenly flounders with no explanation to be found in a close analysis of its financial management systems, the only reasonable explanation is that “not everything is making it to the bank,” the expert said.

Carstens will return to court for sentencing at a later date.

A person convicted of the crime for which Carstens was found guilty can be sentenced to up to 20 years or a fine of three times the amount embezzled, or both imprisonment and a fine.