The lore of American thrift and personal finance going back to Benjamin Franklin is full of admirable tales of disciplined savers and investors who, over many years, turn pocket change and small bills into a comfortable nest egg.

Margo Reed’s story is not one of those tales.

Still, there was a perverse reminder that a little can go a long way when she was sentenced on Wednesday after pleading guilty in February to making off with $163,582 in library fines collected by the three public library branches in Yonkers over a seven-year period.

Ms. Reed, 54, was sentenced to shock probation — six months in the Westchester County Jail and the rest of the next five years on probation — by Richard A. Molea, acting justice of the State Supreme Court, after she pleaded guilty to felony charges of grand larceny and filing false tax returns. She will also have to make restitution for the amount of the theft. Prosecutors had sought a state prison sentence, which would have meant at least a year in prison.

Her lawyer, Lawrence Sykes, said that she had no prior record of arrests or convictions, but had a gambling addiction — including gambling in Atlantic City and playing the lottery — that helped lead to her crime.