Hays Post

A Hays woman involved in a multimillion probate case regarding Fort Hays State University and the estate of Earl O. Field has been indicted for mail fraud, according to documents.

The indictment of Wanda Oborny, recently unsealed by the U.S. District Court in Wichita, alleges that in March 2013, “the defendant herein, with the intent to defraud, devised and participated in a scheme and artifice to defraud and obtain money by materially false and fraudulent pretenses and representations, and in order to execute and attempt to execute the scheme and artifice to defraud, knowingly and willfully caused a thing and matter to be sent and delivered by the United States Postal Service, in interstate commerce, according to the directions thereon, that is, the defendant mailed and caused another to mail several documents to the person and institution identified by initials below, representing that E.O.F. was deceased and that one document contained within this mailing modified E.O.F.’s Last Will and Testament by dividing the residuary estate as follows – one fourth to an educational institution, one fourth to the person who drafted E.O.F.’s 2010 Last Will and Testament and one half to defendant.”

The indictment was filed in January and was recently unsealed.

Click HERE for the complete indictment.

In June, a judge rejected an alleged codicil that would have shifted the bulk of the Field estate – estimated around $20 million – from the Fort Hays State University Foundation to Oborny, his longtime caretaker.

The Foundation argued the codicil was fake, and Field had continued with his desire for the estate to be given to the Foundation until his death Feb. 19, 2013.

Oborny argued Field had changed his mind writing a codicil to his will that gave Oborny 50 percent of the estate.

The mail fraud case is expected to be heard in Wichita.