Stepdaughter Pleads To Theft From Ex-Bayer Exec

PITTSBURGH (AP) - A western Pennsylvania woman has pleaded no contest to charges she stole more than $1 million from her stepfather, a retired Bayer executive suffering from Alzheimer's disease, and her mother.

Fifty-seven-year-old Kimberly Gerard, of Sewickley, was sentenced to three years' probation Thursday after pleading no contest to deceiving 84-year-old Olga Ostern and her husband, 87-year-old Wilhelm Ostern, into signing a power of attorney. Olga Ostern was hospitalized at the time while Wilhelm, Bayer's former chief financial officer, suffers from dementia.

Gerard spent nearly all of the couple's $1.3 million bank account by September 2007, and Allegheny County prosecutors say she also pressured her parents into signing over their $450,000 home near Pittsburgh.

Gerard has returned the home as restitution but prosecutors and other family agreed the money is irretrievable.