- A Florida woman is accused of stealing $438K from a Utah bank.
- Kristin Kunstler allegedly used a fake ID to obtain a cashier's check.
- Kunstler has a history of fraud, with similar cases in Texas and Minnesota.
LOGAN — A 42-year-old Florida woman is accused of illegally withdrawing more than $400,000 from a Utah bank.
Kristin Cara Kunstler, of Fort Lauderdale, was charged on Thursday in 1st District Court with communications fraud, theft by deception, and two counts of identity fraud, all second-degree felonies, and money laundering, a third-degree felony.
In May of 2024, investigators say Kunstler "entered a Mountain America Credit Union branch in Logan," and using a fake driver's license, "obtained a cashier's check in (another woman's) name for $438,000" from that woman's home equity line of credit, according to charging documents.
Kunstler handed the bank teller "identification which had (the woman's husband's) Arizona identification number and (the woman's) name and date of birth," an arrest warrant states.
The victim's husband reported the incident to the police in August after the bank informed him that he had an outstanding payment due, the charges state.
Detectives learned through their investigation that some of the money was being held in a bank account in Houston, according to the charges.
"Ultimately, Kunstler was identified as the culprit in the Logan incident, after local law enforcement was apprised of a similar string of crimes committed by Kunstler in Texas earlier that month," the charges state.
An arrest warrant further states that a detective investigating the Utah theft talked with police in Longview, Texas, and "found the suspect in both cases matched in body and appeared to be wearing the exact same clothing on surveillance (video) only a few days prior to my incident."
Investigators discovered Kunstler had been convicted in two cases in Minnesota and that "the modus operandi for the Longview case was the same as the Minnesota cases," the warrant states. Police "also found in Kristin's criminal history numerous fraud cases of a similar nature to the charges in (the Utah) case, the Longview case, and the Minnesota cases."
Kunstler also served time in a Florida jail, "where she was serving on convictions for similar fraud cases," according to the warrant.
