A county employee in Little Rock, Arkansas has recently landed in hot water for misuse of county-issued credit cards. Apparently, the employee spent over $150,000 at the local Wal-Mart with the Wal-Mart credit card that was issued to her. These purchases included tobacco products, food, and a number of additional personal items.
Apparently, the county employee made these purchases during the period between January 1, 2002 and the end of 2006. She was able to make these unauthorized purchases because she had been a trusted employee with the county for over 16 years. In addition, her position was an administrative assistant to the County Judge and she had previously worked beneath three other judges in the county.
It seems the county employee was designated to sign the financial statements and claims when the judge was not in the office. Now, in light of what has recently occurred, the judge is making sure to sign all of the statements himself. After the county underwent an audit, however, the employee admitted to the judge that she had used the credit card to purchase “a lot” of unauthorized items and she further admitted that she had used the credit card in the “wrong manner.”
Following the employee’s admittance to wrong doing, the judge asked her for her resignation. Before the employee’s admission, however, the auditors had already discovered that a number of unauthorized purchases had taken place on the cards. This discovery was made when they found that several of the monthly credit card statements did not include itemized receipts listing the items that had been purchased. It turns out some of these purchases had included jellybeans, bubble gum, soft drinks, eggs, pizza, smokeless tobacco and cigarettes.
The investigation regarding the county employee is still underway. It is possible that felony theft charges will be filed against the employee within the next two weeks. In addition, county employees are no longer permitted to use their Wal-Mart credit cards. The judge has stated that he does not believe other county employees were involved with the scam and he does not believe anyone else was aware it was taking place.
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