Gary Klien reports in the Marin Independent Journal:
A Martinez woman who used another person’s identity to get a $20,000 breast lift and tummy tuck in Greenbrae was sentenced Wednesday to nine months in the Marin County Jail.
She nearly got away with it, but a get-well bouquet and a navel itch were her undoing.
Londie Bowman, 32, will surrender at the jail in October, said her lawyer, deputy public defender Eva Bennett.
The case began in late February when a woman scheduled a “Mommy Makeover” — a breast lift, tummy tuck and liposuction — at Plastic Surgery Specialists in Greenbrae.
The operation was scheduled for Feb. 28 but on that day Bowman had only $12,000 in financing, so she provided a debit card to pay the rest.
When that transaction was denied, she called a bank supervisor who approved the transaction over the phone for a clinic workers. When Plastic Surgery Specialists sent a post-surgery bouquet to the patient’s address in Martinez, doctors learned that a different woman lived there. That woman, Maija Lamberts, said her purse and financial cards had been stolen several months earlier in Martinez.
The case might have stalled there, but Bowman called back for follow-up because her navel itched. Deputies were waiting when she arrived for the appointment.The person who pretended to be a bank officer was never identified.
Bowman also is to be arraigned Friday in Martinez on related related identity theft charges, Contra Costa County prosecutors said.
Full story – Marin Independent Journal