Woman is charged in credit card fraud

A former Hawaii beauty queen who went to prison after pleading guilty to 140 identity theft-related crimes is again in trouble with the law, this time for allegedly padding the credit card charges of customers of a restaurant where she worked as a waitress.

An Oahu grand jury returned an indictment Tuesday charging Susan E. Shaw with computer fraud and fraudulent use of a credit card. Circuit Judge Colette Garibaldi issued a $50,000 bench warrant for Shaw’s arrest.

Deputy Prosecutor Ashley Tanaka told Garibaldi that Shaw, 43, was working as a waitress at Square Barrels downtown from Jan. 16 to May 18 when she “padded the bills of 105 customers by adding additional amounts on the tip line of the bills, and did so after the customers had written a lower amount on their receipts.”

Tanaka said Shaw’s scheme came to light after a customer, who dined at the restaurant in May, used her credit card to pay her $105 bill. The customer added a $10 tip, but when checking her credit card statement several days later, she saw that her charge was for $125. The customer called police.

A restaurant manager said the company then did an audit of the transactions handled by Shaw and discovered 104 more victims. He said the restaurant refunded all of the affected customers the money they were overcharged and that the incident has caused the owners a significant amount of pain. They knew that Shaw had previous convictions but hired her on the recommendation of a personal friend.

The manager said Shaw worked at the restaurant for 5-1/2 months. He said she started out padding credit card bills by 50 cents and $1.

Shaw pleaded guilty in 2011 to theft, identity theft, credit card theft, forgery, unauthorized possession of confidential personal information and using a computer to commit the crimes involving the theft of more than $160,000 from seven credit card companies.

The state said Shaw applied for and received credit cards in the names of people whose identities she had stolen, then used the cards to make purchases before the credit card companies canceled the cards after realizing what had happened.

The prosecutor said Shaw spent the money she stole on designer clothes and accessories and frequent travel to and from California, where she had a boyfriend and rented condominium, while also living with her children and another boyfriend in Kailua. The prosecutor said Shaw also spent the stolen money on overseas travel.

A state judge sentenced Shaw in May 2011 to 20 years in prison.

Tanaka said Shaw was on parole for that case when she committed the crimes detailed in Tuesday’s indictment.

Shaw was the 1992 Miss Hawaii International.