Fort Meade Guard In Top-Secret Job Pleads Guilty To $40K Theft

FORT MEADE, MD — A security guard at a top secret area in Fort Meade pleaded guilty Tuesday to theft for lying about her work hours and being paid $40,000 she didn't earn, according to federal officials. Shawn Penn, 41, of Pasadena, was charged in October 2016 with making false claims and lying to her employer that she was working as a security guard at a government facility, when she was actually elsewhere.

Penn faces a maximum sentence of five years in prison for each of the four counts of making false claims, and for making false statements, according to the U.S. Attorney's office.

According to the five-count indictment, Penn worked as a contract employee performing security guard services for the U.S. Department of Defense in Anne Arundel County. In addition, Penn worked full-time, during regular business hours, as an active duty U.S. Army Intelligence Officer at Fort Meade.
Penn performed her security guard services for a facility which required that she hold a top secret-sensitive compartmented information security clearance, possess a gun permit, and carry a government-issued duty cell phone while on duty. Surveillance cameras monitored her work station area, and areas inside and outside the building.

Prosecutors say that from September 2015 to August 2016, Penn regularly left her work station and lied to her employer that she had been working as a security guard when she was actually elsewhere. Because of her false claims regarding her security work hours, Penn was paid more than $40,000 to which she was not entitled.

On October 6, 2016, Penn lied to investigators from the Defense Criminal Investigative Service when she said she had not abandoned her security guard duties until January 2016, when in fact, she had been abandoning her duties since at least September 2015, according to the indictment. Penn told the investigators that she “sat in her car,” was “across the street,” or “drove around the parking lot,” during her guard shifts, when she was elsewhere during those shifts.

A date for her sentencing has not been set.

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