Mercer Woman To Pay $268K She Fraudulently Collected In Police Pension

MERCER COUNTY, NJ – A Mercer County woman was ordered by court to repay $268,000 she fraudulently collected from her dead cop husband’s pension, NJ Attorney General Mathre Platkin said.

Sandra VonScheven, 49, of Hamilton fraudulently collected the amount in form of survivor benefits after she remarried and was no longer eligible.

On Aug. 23, the state Superior Court ordered VonScheven to pay restitution in full to the New Jersey Division of Pension and Benefits. Judge Additionally she was ordered to serve a term of probation conditioned on 364 days in the county jail.

The court suspended the jail term pending the defendant’s successful completion of probation.

“This sentence should serve as a warning that we will not allow individuals to enrich themselves at the expense of New Jersey taxpayers and public servants,” Platkin said.

“This crime went on for nearly a decade, but it was ultimately detected and the defendant held responsible.”

“For years the defendant unlawfully collected taxpayer funds she knew she should no longer be getting, instead of doing the right thing and informing the State that she had remarried,” Drew Skinner, Executive Director of OPIA said. “As a result of this case, the defendant will be held to account and to repay her ill-gotten gains.”

In November 2001, VonScheven began collecting survivor spousal benefits from the pension after her husband, a retired municipal police officer in New Jersey, died.

Surviving spouses are entitled to widow or widower’s benefits under the Police and Firemen’s Retirement System. Survivor benefits continue for life or until the surviving spouse remarries.

VonScheven remarried on January 15, 2010, and her survivor benefits should have been discontinued, but she kept accepting the benefits through November 2019, without notifying authorities she had remarried.

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