A longtime bankruptcy court clerk who routinely dealt with people facing mounting debt is accused of giving out false information so she could pocket their money.

Sandra Butler, 42, of Chicago was charged with attempted extortion Monday. She worked in the Dirksen Federal Building since 1985 and most recently as a courtroom deputy assigned to U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Jacqueline Cox. The feds say she took $500 from an undercover witness and told him it would pay to block foreclosure of his home.

But what she told him -- and possibly others -- was false, U.S. Bankruptcy Court Clerk Ken Gardner said. Such a foreclosure -- or sale of any other assets -- is automatically stopped when someone files for bankruptcy. Gardner immediately fired Butler on Monday from her $69,000-a-year job. Butler was released on a $4,500 bond.

"The clerk's office is in the business of holding up the integrity of the judicial system," Gardner said. "I am disappointed an employee has been charged with this offense."

The feds were on to Butler after a debtor told the FBI that in 2002, Butler asked for $5,000 to stop foreclosure of the woman's house. She later learned the money didn't go toward stopping foreclosure.

The feds sent in an undercover witness Sept. 1 who approached Butler, saying he had just filed for bankruptcy and needed help because he feared losing his home. Instead of telling him his bankruptcy petition alone would stay the foreclosure, Butler allegedly took $500 from him purportedly to block the foreclosure.

Butler even staged a phone call to Chase Financial, pretending to arrange the transaction, according to an FBI affidavit. The phone call couldn't be legitimate, investigators say, because the undercover witness used a fake name and there was no such mortgage she said she looked up.

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