SKOWHEGAN — A hearing to determine how Anson’s former tax collector, convicted in a historic municipal embezzlement case a decade ago, is to pay the hundreds of thousands of dollars prosecutors say she still owes the town in restitution was delayed several months.

Claudia Viles was at Somerset County Superior Court on Tuesday for a hearing on state prosecutors’ request to enforce the payment of $475,585.74 they believed she still owed the town as of April. Viles was ordered to pay $566,257.65 in restitution when sentenced in 2016.

But with neither Viles’ attorney nor the prosecutor prepared for a full hearing, and the court already hours behind on a jam-packed criminal docket for the day, Superior Court Chief Justice Robert E. Mullen agreed to postpone the hearing.

Viles’ attorney, Charles T. Ferris, whom court records indicate she hired at the end of last week, told Mullen it would have been “irresponsible” to proceed with the case Tuesday, given the two sides still need to exchange information and address some procedural matters.

“The state was unaware of certain aspects of this case; I was unaware of certain aspects,” Ferris said. “We’re not prepared today.”

Assistant Attorney General Leanne Robbin, who prosecuted Viles in the 2016 trial, agreed. The two attorneys were to propose possible dates for a rescheduled hearing in August or September. A new date was not immediately set.

The Office of the Maine Attorney General is asking a judge to find Viles in default, Robbin wrote in an April filing. A judge could then order Viles to pay the restitution in a “reasonable manner” or send her to jail for up to six months.

As of April, court records show, Anson’s restitution has come from various sources. The town received the $58,500 that state police found at Viles’ home while executing a search warrant early in their criminal investigation; $27,000 from selling its interest in two of Viles’ properties; and $5,171.91 in payments from Viles to the Maine Department of Corrections while she served her sentence.

Viles completed probation in July 2024, Robbin wrote in her filing. State law indicates Viles must now make the payments through the attorney general’s office.

Since the April filing, Viles has made an additional payment of $2,000, attorney general’s office spokesperson Rebecca Stefansky said last month.

The town also received $250,000 from its insurance company, the Maine Municipal Association. That was paid out before the town sued Viles and prosecutors charged her criminally. 

But MMA wants its money back, town officials say. And as far as prosecutors are concerned, the insurance payment on the town’s claim is not restitution.

The town also has two civil judgments that allow it to collect the restitution Viles owes. 

One is a conversion of the criminal restitution order, while the other stems from the town’s civil lawsuit against Viles that preceded her indictment, court records show. The latter is for the same amount but includes an additional order for $39,620.52 in prejudgment interest.

The town still has liens on all of Viles’ real estate, which is in Anson and Embden, said former town administrator Nancy Gove, who worked with the attorney general’s office on the current restitution enforcement effort before leaving her post in Anson in April.

However the money is paid — through a civil or administrative process, during probation to the corrections department or now to the attorney general’s office — it all counts the same toward the restitution Viles owes, said attorney general’s office spokesperson Danna Hayes.

Viles, now 76, of North Anson, was Anson’s elected tax collector from 1982 to 2015 and held other town positions from 1973 to 1982.

She steadfastly maintained her innocence while the criminal case unfolded a decade ago. At her sentencing, she vowed to clear her name as long as she is living.

But both her appeal of her convictions to the Maine Supreme Judicial Court and a post-conviction petition were unsuccessful.

The investigation into her embezzlement began in early 2015 when the town implemented new financial software and town administrative assistant Triss Smith discovered a $77,000 discrepancy in the excise tax collected and the amount deposited.

Auditors later examined town records going back to 2010 and determined the missing excise tax money totaled $500,948.

According to newspaper archives, Viles stayed in her job amid the criminal investigation and civil lawsuit initially brought by the town against her — until a grand jury indicted her in September 2015 and the Maine Municipal Association said it could no longer bond her as tax collector.

A jury ultimately convicted Viles a year later of all counts: one felony count of theft by unauthorized taking or transfer, 11 misdemeanor counts of failure to pay tax or file a return and one misdemeanor count of tampering with public records or information.

Robbin, who likened Viles during the trial to a free-range chicken and a fox guarding the henhouse, said at the time that Viles likely had been embezzling funds since the beginning of her tenure as tax collector. A statute of limitations on the theft offense limited the scope of prosecutors’ case to a period beginning in 2009.

Evidence also convinced the jury Viles did not file personal income tax returns for years, and some motor vehicle registration forms she was responsible for were never located.

Mullen sentenced Viles to eight years in prison, with all but five years suspended, and three years of probation. He also ordered her to pay the town of Anson $566,257.65 in restitution: $500,948 for the theft of excise taxes and $65,309.65 for economic losses.

The attorney general’s office believes it is the largest municipal theft to be prosecuted in state history.