Three sentenced in Pierce Commercial Bank fraud

Three employees who participated in the mortgage fraud scheme that brought down Pierce Commercial Bank were sentenced Wednesday to prison terms.

The three and their sentences are Jill Redding, 48, of Puyallup, six months; Tonya M. Ruf, 37, of Puyallup, seven months; Katherine J. Friske, 54, of Menifee, Calif., four months. Each also was sentenced to three years of supervised release.

The three worked at PC Bank Home Loans, a subsidiary of Pierce Commercial. They helped file false documents that enabled a ring led by bank employee Shawn Portmann to make hundreds of fraudulent loans, eventually causing losses of more than $10 million.

Portman and five other co-conspirators are scheduled for sentencing in January.

By Seattle Times business staff