A former employee at this Leelanau County cement plant suspected of stealing a whole lot of money.
Deputies believe she stole at least $100,000 between 2008 and 2016.
She worked as a payroll accountant at Leelanau Redi-Mix near Maple City in Leelanau County.
The Leelanau County Sheriff says this is one of the bigger embezzlement cases he’s seen and the $100,000 they believe was stolen, could be just the beginning.
“If this money is missing, and it’s shown that this individual did take the money, it’s a very serious offense,” said Sheriff Mike Borkovich.
The investigation started back in July of 2016 when deputies got a tip about someone possibly stealing money from Leelanau Redi-Mix. Eventually they zeroed in on a former payroll accountant who was let go from her job the day deputies started their investigation.
“I think sometime there’s a trust factor in business especially small businesses where you have someone who has access to financial records, In this particular case it appears to be a person who had control of records books and money, and was doing it for a long period of time,” said Borkovich.
Deputies believe it happened over an 8 year period and that $100,000 amount could rise. They arrested the woman on Friday. She bonded out of jail.
“It takes a long time to look at the records, to dig up things, to interview people, and if you will connect all the dots. We like to be certain of our cases before we go through with them,” said Borkovich.
We went to the cement plant and were told they had no comment. Community members say they’re sad to hear this happened to a business that is a staple in the community.
“It’s really a shame that people would do that even a small business, even if it’s a big business. Disappointed, it’s not a good thing to have happen. It’s a lot of money, I guess anything can happen, but pretty shocking,” said Mitch McAdams.
The woman who was arrested will be back in court next week to be formally charged and we will be able to give you her name then.
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