She is cute, cunning and a con artist.
Jessica Wolcott, 23, a high school dropout from Greensburg, was sentenced to 21 months in federal prison this week after pleading guilty to extorting $125,000 from a married business executive she met online and threatened to expose as an adulterer.
Using the screen name "cheater eater," Wolcott e-mailed threats to Gary Wandschneider, the millionaire CEO of Pepsi Bottling in Somers, N.Y., threatening to expose him to his family and his company. Wandschneider went to the FBI rather than meet her demands.
U.S. District Judge Kenneth Karas of White Plains, N.Y., Thursday sentenced Wolcott to prison, calling her a "grifter" and a "con artist." Rejecting a defense plea for leniency, Karas said a prison sentence was required "so she understands the con doesn't work with everyone."
Contacted in New York, Wolcott said she knows her story has made headlines.
"It's been that way for awhile," she said. She declined further comment.
In court, Wolcott apologized.
"I just want to say I am sorry about everything that has happened and the last 15 months have not been a slap on the wrist or easy or anything that I could have imagined," she told Karas.
Wolcott must surrender Feb. 1 to begin serving her sentence. Federal prosecutors are demanding she return $25,000 in a bank account plus more than 122 ounces of gold that she purchased.
Wolcott surfaced in Greensburg in 2004 and lived in the city until October 2006 when she was evicted from a Park Street apartment for not paying her rent, according to her former landlord, Fred Gunter of New Stanton.
Gunter said she was "one of the worst tenants I ever had. She constantly lied to me. She didn't pay her rent. She moved in and didn't even pay her electric bill."
Wolcott told Gunter that she had income from a trust fund.
"She told me she was getting $1,500 a month and she didn't have to worry about paying rent."
After she stopped paying rent, Wolcott refused to move and stayed there another three months.
"She finally left," he said.
Wolcott told Gunter she worked as a model.
"She was always flying to New York for her modeling business," he said. "She would be gone for weeks and weeks at a time."
When she moved into the apartment in 2004, she told Gunter she was a senior marketing agent for a magazine in Orlando, Fla.
According to the FBI, Wandschneider was browsing a Web site that links attractive women to wealthy business executives "who are seeking romantic relationships," and met Wolcott on Craigslist.com.
Before Wolcott began making demands, Wandschneider gave her $30,000, which she deposited in First Commonwealth Bank in Indiana, Pa. The FBI said Wolcott then withdrew the cash and deposited it in a bank in Sayre, Bradford County.
Wolcott later demanded $125,000 from Wandschneider, threatening that she would inform his wife of his infidelities if he did not comply.
"I'm sure this is an unpleasant surprise," Wolcott wrote in one e-mail. "I'm sure when your wife finds out that you've been looking for a fill in for her on such a site, it will be unpleasant for her, too."
In another message, she wrote:
"I'm sure the company would be very proud to have an employee with such high morals," she wrote. "I will be presenting all of the e-mails and showing them all to your wife."
In a subsequent e-mail, Wolcott explained her motivation.
"I don't like cheaters, not at all, so men like you have become my profession. Catching men trying to through (sic) money around in the act and outing them," she wrote.
Wandschneider reported the threats to the FBI, who arranged a sting operation and e-mailed money to Wolcott. Agents wired nearly $20,000 to Wolcott to meet her demands before arresting her.
"Here's to hoping your life is still a living hell, and worrying every day that your name will be in the news or on a TV movie for what you've done to your wife and the resources you've used as a CEO for your job," Wolcott wrote.
She added:
"I'm still waiting for the rest of the payment ... ."
Wolcott was arrested last year and pleaded guilty to extortion in October 2006. She was released on bond, but a judge issued a warrant for her arrest after she hit a woman in the head with a glass in a bar in Seneca Falls, N.Y. Police arrested Wolcott after she gave them a phony name and Social Security number. She also cut off the electronic monitor attached to her ankle, according to court records.
Under the terms of her pretrial release, Wolcott was allowed to leave her home only for school, work or court-ordered mental health treatment.
Wandschneider has since left Pepsi Bottling.
