New York Woman Sentenced to Prison for Newtown Sandy Hook Charity Scam

A New York woman who posed as a family member of one of the students killed during the Sandy Hook school shooting massacre in a scheme to scam money through the Internet was sentenced to eight months in prison on Tuesday.

Nouel Alba, 37, a mother of two living in the Bronx, admitted that she posed as the aunt of Noah Pozner, one of the 20 children killed during the shooting last year.

Alba did so in order to set up a fake funeral fund through which she collected money from donors. The money was solicited through a Facebook page she set up and paid through a PayPal account set up in her name, The Newtown Bee reports.

According to prosecutors, Alba launched her scam less than 24 hours after the shootings took place. She collected a total of $240 between Dec. 14 and 20, 2012.

"The thought that someone would scheme so quickly and deliberately to benefit from an unspeakable tragedy is beyond belief," Kimberly Mertz, FBI special agent in charge said in a statement. "While there wasn't a substantial loss of money in this investigation, there were losses beyond any pecuniary measure."

CNN says that it was contacted by a member of the Pozner family who informed them that the scam was taking place.

According to the news outlet, one of their producers along with a camera crew went to Alba's house to cover the story. Alba told CNN that the bank account connected to her Facebook page did indeed belong to her. Alba denied taking part in a scam, however, on an episode of "Anderson Cooper 360" that aired in December.

The United States Attorney's office told reporters that the FBI contacted Alba after seeing the CNN report on TV. She told the agents assigned to the case that she did not post anything related to the Newtown massacre on Facebook and that she hadn't recently accessed her PayPal account.

An investigation ensued and Alba was arrested on Dec. 27 on a criminal complaint. In June of this year, Alba pleaded guilty to wire fraud and making false statements to federal officers.

In addition to her eight month prison sentence, Alba will also serve two years of supervised release, but will not have to pay any fines.