HOUSTON -- Verizon Wireless wants a fired employee to return about $700,000 in mistaken severance and bonus payments.

When Tonya Young, a $30,000-a-year marketing and sales clerk, was laid off Sept. 30, an accounting error changed her payments from $10,014.49 to $1,001,449, according to a company lawsuit filed Thursday.

After tax withholdings, she received $701,860.13 too much, said Verizon attorneys B.D. Daniel and Fields Alexander.

Young already has spent more than $100,000, the lawsuit said.

"I was informed by Ms. Young that she had bills to pay, had taken some of the funds out, and would not pay back the amount paid to her in error," Verizon representative Jerome C. Feinthel said in an affidavit.

On Friday, a judge granted a temporary restraining order and a garnishment of her bank accounts. A hearing was set for Monday.

The Bergen Record

-- Anonymous, November 11, 2001