N.H. man sentenced in scam of Windsor woman

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A 42-year-old New Hampshire man has been sentenced to six months in prison and three years of supervised released after pleading guilty to interstate transportation of a stolen check in relation to a scam perpetrated upon a Windsor, Vt., woman.

Nicholas Melanson, of Manchester, N.H., was sentenced on Monday, Aug. 12 by Chief U.S. District Judge Christina Reiss, who also ordered Melanson to pay $1,500 in restitution to the victim of his offense.

According to court records, over the course of nine days in May 2022, Melanson traveled five times from New Hampshire to the Vermont residence of an elderly Windsor woman. Each time Melanson traveled to her home, he picked her up and drove her to one or more banks where she had accounts. Once at the banks, she made withdrawals and conducted other transactions, and Melanson obtained checks and/or cash from her. The attempted or completed financial transactions that Melanson facilitated or conducted for the woman totaled at least $392,000, though many of the transactions were ultimately stopped or reversed.

Melanson received $1,500 cash and a $3,000 “bonus” payment for his role in the victimization of the woman, and he hoped to be paid $10,000 a month to continue manipulating her financial activities. Even though Melanson had never met the woman previously and only interacted with her those five times, he quickly observed that she was confused, opined that she was “starting to have Alzheimer’s,” and believed she was not able to make informed decisions about large financial transactions without guidance and instruction from someone else. Melanson’s conduct only stopped when he was arrested by the Windsor Police Department at one of the victim’s banks on May 19, 2022.

Working on the case were the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, the U.S. Secret Service and the Windsor Police Department.