Ex-7-Eleven manager sentenced in $32,000 theft from store

A former 7-Eleven manager was sentenced Wednesday to 180 days in jail and three years’ probation for a plot to steal $32,000 from the Costa Mesa store where she worked and then report a carjacking in an attempt to cover it up, according to court records.

An Orange County Superior Court judge handed down the sentence immediately after Nora Cortez Mercado, 38, pleaded guilty to two felony counts of conspiracy to commit a crime.

In August 2014, Mercado, a Santa Ana resident, called the Costa Mesa Police Department to report that she was robbed while on her way to make a bank deposit with $32,000 in cash from the convenience store, police said.

Authorities said she told investigators that a masked man with a handgun approached her in an alley behind the store at Orange Avenue and East 17th Street. Mercado claimed the robber took the cash and her 2003 Chevrolet Malibu, according to authorities.

Investigators said they discovered discrepancies in her story during a follow-up interview and arrested her.

Originally, authorities believed that a Santa Ana man, Jose Zarate Alvarez, helped Mercado in the plot, but charges against him were dropped about two months later.

Alvarez’s lawyer argued that Mercado implicated Alvarez in an attempt to deflect blame.