By JESSICA SIEFF
Niles Daily Star

When Patricia Newman, a Niles resident, first met John Watson, she had hired him to mow her lawn during the summer of 2009.

It would be months later when Newman would face Watson, not as an employer, but a victim.

Newman recounted inside a courtroom at the Berrien County 5th District Court Tuesday morning how she had been sitting in the waiting room at United Federal Credit Union when the approximately 24 year-old Watson, also of Niles, approached her.

“He saw me and my husband sitting there and he come over and talked to us and he asked me if we were there because of him,” Newman said.

Newman had determined months after hiring Watson to mow her lawn that he’d used the information off a check she’d written to him to fuel, according to the defense, an online gambling habit.

According to testimony heard Monday from both the prosecution and the defense during a preliminary examination, Watson allegedly used Newman’s account information to pull out more than $1,000 from her checking account.

He reportedly used the money through an online gambling site that he’d used a friend’s personal information to set up after his previous account was shut down.

Newman said on the day that she waited inside the credit union to sort out the missing funds from her checking account, Watson “said he was sorry and wanted to repay” her the funds.

“He mentioned that he had a little girl and he hoped I wouldn’t prosecute,” Newman said.

Watson sat in court Monday and listened to testimony from Newman and Niles City Police Officer Kevin Kosten, who testified that he’d had a phone conversation with Watson that led to a confession.

“He said he wanted to be honest about it,” Kosten said.

Apparently admitting to a gambling problem, Kosten said Watson told him “it got out of control and he was spending more than he could pay back.”

It could not be determined whether or not Watson had put money back into Newman’s account while he was taking it, as had been insinuated by the defense.

Prosecutor Mary Malesky added a charge of identity theft to three counts of financial transaction of illegal sale/use and one count of computer use to commit a crime.

Watson allegedly made 12 transactions in which he took money from Newman’s checking account on approximately nine occasions according to Kosten’s testimony.

A trial date was set for Aug. 17-19.