We all hear about employees who steal from their employers. Since the Recession and the economic downturn, employee theft has been up considerably. Employees have personal financial difficulties, they get into all sorts of economic trouble, and then they embezzle to compensate. Pretty remarkable, but many go for a long time before they are finally caught. If they are caught.
We hear about bartenders who still from the till, employees who create a false vendor account in the company files and then invoice and pay for goods and services never rendered.
But here is a woman who stole from the church. She stole more than $1 Million from the Archdiocese of New York. A million bucks. That’s quite a bit more than robbing the collection plate. She was sentenced to 4 and a half to nine years in prison. As she is an elderly woman, that’s a tough price to pay. But as they say…if you can’t do the time…..
According to the article in the Wall Street Journal, A the Archdiocese had not conducted a background check that would have had revealed this woman had been caught stealing in the past.
According to the article…”Collins had previously been convicted of grand larceny in 1999 for stealing $46,000 from a temporary employment agency. However, officials from the Archdiocese, who did not comment on Collins’ sentencing Thursday, have said they were unaware of Collins past criminal record because they were not doing pre-employment background checks when they hired her in 2003.
Authorities say that between July 2004 and December 2011 as an accounts payable clerk, Collins cut 468 unauthorized checks to “KB Collins” and deposited them in a bank account she controlled. She then manipulated the Archdiocese’s computer accounting system to make it appear as if they checks had been issued to a legitimate vendor.”
