The first COVID-19 fraudster sentenced in La Salle County thinks her five-year prison term was excessive. Ebony Green will ask for a lesser sentence at a March 19 hearing.

Ebony Green, 29, of University Park, had entered a blind plea to theft in La Salle County Circuit Court. Prosecutors, in turn, agreed to recommend no more than five years in prison. At a Jan. 29 sentencing hearing, Circuit Judge Michelle A. Vescogni rejected Green’s request for probation.

Now, Green is asking for a do-over hearing. Green and Assistant Public Defender Doug Kramarsic filed a motion to reconsider the sentence.

“(The) court did not give sufficient consideration to the hardship a prison sentence would have on (Green’s) family,” Kramarsic wrote. “(The) court’s sentence was excessive in view of (Green’s) capacity for rehabilitation and past criminal history.”

Green had applied for a loan, claiming to run a daycare service in Ottawa with earnings of $100,000. Green was caught in part because she filed a contradictory tax return disclosing she’s a hair stylist who earned a fraction of that sum.

The fraudulent documents helped Green receive $20,832, which she must repay as part of her sentence.

Six people were charged in La Salle County with defrauding the government of COVID-19 relief funds. Just one of the other charged subjects has pleaded guilty and stood for sentencing. That subject, however, drew a much lighter sentence than Green – even though their cases and personal backgrounds were substantially similar.

Amanda Rogers, 34, of Ottawa, also entered a blind plea to theft for fraudulently collecting $20,832. As with Green, she cited having dependent children as grounds for drawing probation.

Rogers and Green were also on felony probation when they filed their fraudulent paperwork. Rogers was on probation for disorderly conduct, while Green was completing second-chance probation for theft.

Despite the parallels, Rogers avoided prison altogether and was sentenced to felony probation with a year in La Salle County Jail.