A Bensalem woman who stole more than $215,000 from a 91-year-old neighbor who had entrusted her with his finances went to prison Wednesday for 11 ½ to 23 months.

Patricia Westerman, 48, lived across the street from the victim, Norman Eddinger. He considered her a friend when he granted her power of attorney after Eddinger’s wife died in August 2015.

Eddinger had severe hearing loss, and therefore struggled to communicate with banks and other businesses. So he turned to Westerman, who abused his trust by maxing out his credit cards, opening new cards in his name, draining his bank account, cashing out Eddinger’s life insurance, stealing his wife’s insurance death benefit, spending his reverse-mortgage funds on herself and then borrowing another large sum against the victim’s home equity.

In all, she stole $215,752, said Deputy District Attorney Marc J. Furber, who prosecuted the case.

Although Westerman disputed that total as being way too high, she pleaded guilty in September to felony charges of identity theft, theft by unlawful taking, access device fraud and two theft-related misdemeanors.

Bucks County President Judge Jeffrey L. Finley on Wednesday sentenced Westerman to serve 11 ½ to 23 months in the Bucks County Correctional Facility. Finley also placed her on four years of concurrent probation and ordered her to pay $214,212 in restitution to Eddinger’s estate and $1,540 to the Victims Compensation Assistance Program.

Eddinger died in October, the month after Westerman’s guilty plea. By then he was living in a nursing home, no longer able to afford nursing care at home, testified Bensalem Township Police Detective Stephen Clark, who investigated the case.

“Because of the money that was depleted, [home care] had to end and he was put into a nursing home,” Clark said. Eddinger also lacked the money to pay his property taxes because of the thefts, the detective testified. 

“Here, Ms. Westerman, you are pleading guilty to looting an individual of every last cent he had over a period of several years,” Finley told the defendant.

Westerman, a nurse, said she had been helping Eddinger with meals, cleaning, shopping and other needs since the summer of 2010, when his wife was still living. The couple had no children or other close relatives to care for them as their health declined, she said.

Westerman denied depleting Eddinger’s money for her own use to the extent described by Clark and Furber. Her attorney, Joseph Capone, said she admits to taking about $100,000.

Westerman said she was financially strapped and working three jobs when she had to take time off to look after Eddinger. In the course of doing that, she said, she mingled her funds with his, insisting that she tried to look out for Eddinger’s best interests.

“A lot of money got spent and mixed up and I didn’t keep track of it,” she told Finley. “I didn’t tell him and it’s my fault….I didn’t want to tell him that I couldn’t handle it for him. I couldn’t do both.”

Furber and Clark said the $215,000 she was charged with stealing was in addition to any legitimate expenses of Eddinger’s that Westerman had paid out of his funds.

“You used the Eddinger monies to transfer them into your own accounts,” Finley told Westerman, “wherein if this was all being done for Mr. Eddinger, you could have simply written out a check” for each expense.

Westerman said she had not learned of Eddinger’s death until well afterward.

“I feel so terrible that he died and I didn’t get a chance to talk to him and explain things, and to say I was sorry that it worked out this way,” she said. She claimed that Eddinger had been happy and well cared for at the nursing home where he spent his final months.

“He may have been happy,” Finley replied, “but unfortunately that was not his own choice.”

Contact: Marc J. Furber, 215.348.6339, mjfurber@buckscounty.org