HOUSTON—It doesn’t matter if you’re a small-business owner, supervisor, retail manager or president of a Fortune 500 company – there’s a good chance you’ll be personally affected by an employee who steals.
Employee theft costs businesses an estimated $52 billion a year, according to some reports, but tracking down the thieves can be tricky.
"A good percentage of the thieves are the most trusted and hard-working employees that a business may have," prosecutor Joni Vollman said.
Take Michael Robin Deese, for example. In September, he was sentenced to 35 years in prison for stealing $1 million from two companies he worked for: John Daugherty Realtors and Lansdown Moody.
Deese took care of the books, apparently without anybody looking over his shoulder. He was writing checks to himself to the tune of $40,000 a pop, prosecutors said.
"It could have gone on forever," Vollman said.
But then Deese went on vacation, and another employee caught on to what he was doing.
Linda Hargrove worked for a doctor in the Medical Center for six years. She was recently arrested after allegedly stealing more than $300,000. The DA’s office said she took checks coming in from patients and insurance companies and deposited them into her own account.
The doctor was considering filing for bankruptcy until Hargrove got caught.
Paul Wade Arnold was in court just last week, charged with stealing more than $200,000 from his employer, the Heights Church of Christ.
Security guard Richard Bostic allegedly falsified his weekly timecard sheets to the tune of 4,966 additional hours. He admitted to "being creative in paying himself additional hours at ABM Security," which resulted in the alleged theft of more than $102,000.
Blanca Grimes is accused of stealing thousands from her employer, Alamo Thrift Bail Bonds. She’s currently out on bond.
Walmart employee Steven Fielder and Kroger employee Tanu Uppal were recently arrested after surveillance cameras caught them stealing more than $3,000 each from cash registers. Both admitted guilt, saying they needed money to pay bills.
The problem for consumers: you're paying higher prices as a result of employee theft. But the good news: thanks to technology, more and more employee thieves are being caught.
During KHOU's investigation, we learned the most common employee theft right now involves false refunds. Some employees are giving refunds to themselves for items they said were returned, but they weren’t.
Others have been caught on tape checking out their friends, but only scanning a couple of the items that left the store.
If you own a business, you’ve been warned.
trexo said on November 11, 2009 at 10:21 AM
Great article. Just another well-timed reminder that employers need to protect themselves against the risk of employee theft. That's why doing background checks and drug screen (and other screening utilities) have become so popular. Employee theft can destroy a small business (refer to the doctor who was about to declare bankruptcy until they discovered that their employee was ripping them off). Paying for the screening tools/process has a real, measureable cost. So, does employee theft. Which of the two costs do you want to pay?