Federal prosecutors accuse a New Mexico woman of fraud in oil and gas royalty case

A New Mexico businesswoman is accused of defrauding the U.S. government and two Native American tribes of taxes and royalties due to them for oil and gas that her companies extracted from leased federal and tribal lands. Federal prosecutors announced this week that Teresa McCown recently was indicted by a grand jury on several wire fraud charges and violations of the Federal Oil and Gas Royalty Management Act. A phone number listed for McCown went unanswered Saturday.