Former Woodall School employee accused of embezzling $45,000

A former Woodall School employee was accused of making personal purchases over the course of two years, totaling $45,000.

On June 7, 2024, Cherokee County Sheriff's Deputy Jimmie Robertson was dispatched to Woodall Public School for an alleged embezzlement call. The school's superintendent, Ginger Knight, said a woman from Amazon Capital Services called the principal on May 24, 2024. The principal was notified that the school was in default of $5,066.

"This account has been in collection for several months," Robertson wrote in the sheriff's report. "[The woman] told her that she had contacted [the former school employee] in reference to this debt and was not making satisfactory progress with her."

As school officials looked more into the matter, they discovered three payments had been lost; a scan of three reissued checks totaling $3,097. There was also an unauthorized purchase of $1,968 from the school's bank purchasing card toward the school's Amazon debt.

"The PO numbers on the scanned checks, these checks did not match the previous checks written for the same PO or for either amount," Robertson said.

The employee was the school's encumbrance and activity accounts clerk, who was still serving in those roles at the time the principal was called. According to the sheriff's report, the employee cleaned out her office on May 27, 2024 and emailed Knight the next day, tendering her resignation.

"Knight contacted Arvest Bank and acquired statements from the school's account. The original statements did not match statements previously submitted by [the employee]. The unauthorized invoices had been deleted from her submitted paperwork," Robertson said.

On June 3, 2024, Knight contacted WEX Fleet Services to cancel fuel cards and remove the former employee from account access.

"Knight was given administrated access to those accounts. She discovered [the former employee] had been making several unauthorized fuel purchases for her personal vehicle," Robertson said.

According to Capt. Derrick Grant's report, school management advised there were a number of unauthorized transactions, totally $15,632. Knight said there was no employment agreement in which the school was to provide fuel or transportation to the former employee.

The superintendent discovered possible unauthorized purchases on the school's activity account on June 11, 2024 and had a certified public accountant to conduct an audit, which was given to Robertson.

Grant said there several purchases that appeared to be personal purchases. Those purchases were for a PlayStation PS5 console, PlayStation wireless headset, PS5 cooling station, PS5 Star Wars game, Vans classic slip-on loafers, a C10 Truck SLAMMED t-shirt, and Vans authentic core classics shoes, totaling $971.

Grant said the dollar amount of unauthorized transactions totaled $45,800; 24,400 in unauthorized Arvest credit card transactions; $15,632 in unauthorized WEX fuel card transactions; and $5,766 in unauthorized Amazon purchasing account transactions.

On Sept. 24, 2024, Grant interviewed the woman, who said she resigned from the school due to reasons unrelated to the investigation. She also claimed she had an agreement with the previous superintendent that she would be compensated when she used her personal vehicle to run errands from the school during business hours.

The employee admitted to making personal purchases with the school's card and reportedly told Grant she was there to take responsibility for her actions.

The reports have been sent to the Cherokee Nation.