A 73-year-old Washington, D.C., woman will spend 15 years in prison for stealing more than $400,000 from a Silver Spring federal employee she met on a dating site.

Montgomery County Circuit Court Judge John Maloney sentenced Janey Sears on Saturday, Aug. 29, to 20 years, suspending all but 15, according to Bethesda Magazine. Sears was also ordered to pay $406,954 in restitution at $10,000 a month after her release and must serve five years of supervised probation.

A jury convicted Sears on July 7 of theft scheme over $100,000, securities fraud and misappropriation of funds by a fiduciary. Jurors deliberated for 75 minutes after a two-day trial, WTOP reported.

Prosecutors said Sears met the victim, a single federal worker in his 50s, on a dating site in September 2019. She presented herself as a Harvard-educated businesswoman who ran a transportation logistics company in D.C. After their first in-person meeting, she convinced him to let her stay the night at his Silver Spring home. She moved in by November 2019.

At Sears's encouragement, the man took out a $150,000 home equity line of credit in May 2020, prosecutors said.

Sears then pitched a phony investment opportunity. She told him he could contribute to an "investment pool" that would buy Pfizer stock and potentially make him "financially independent," claiming the deal was normally reserved for wealthy investors, prosecutors said. No such pool existed. Sears deposited the money into her own accounts.

Between August 2021 and May 2023, the man paid Sears $406,954 through checks, wire transfers and cash, according to prosecutors. She spent $55,000 on a 2022 Alfa Romeo Giulia, telling the victim her father gave her the car. She gambled away more than $100,000 at MGM, Maryland Live and Ocean Resort Casino in New Jersey, prosecutors said.

At the sentencing hearing, the victim told the court he drives a 2001 Toyota Camry and lives frugally.

"It's been an incredibly tough 3 1/2 years since now-convicted felon Ms. Sears left my house. I have to live with this every day I wake up. … It takes a toll on you," he said.

Montgomery County Assistant State's Attorney Hannah Gleason said Sears "obliterated" the victim's life savings. Both Gleason and Judge Maloney expressed doubt the victim would ever see the restitution money, The Baltimore Banner reported.

Before sentencing, Sears blamed the victim in her statement to the court, saying he had "anger management issues" and could have stopped writing checks. Judge Maloney called her remarks "victim blaming" and said she had led a "life of schemes."

Sears appeared in court wearing a khaki jail jumpsuit and shackles, The Banner reported. Her defense attorney, Archibald McFadden, had asked for 18 months' probation, arguing Sears could work to pay restitution and had family trusts and land in Texas that could be liquidated.

Gleason told the court Sears had five other fraud-related convictions dating back to 1982.