Former employee accused of embezzling $300K from YWCA

EVERETT, Wash. — A Granite Falls woman was arrested Tuesday morning on charges that she stole $300,000 while managing a YWCA apartment complex in Everett.

According to a Snohomish County police document, 42-year-old Stephanie A. Koppisch managed the Everett complex from October 2007 to January 2011.

In the summer of 2010, YWCA staff noticed that the rent for the apartments was low, but when asked, Koppisch said it was because of the bad economy.

With revenue still showing as low in October 2010, Patricia Ryals, housing director for the YWCA, and MaryAnne Dillon, senior regional director for Snohomish County YWCA, said they began meeting weekly with Koppisch.

By December 2010, it was estimated the Wear to Live Apartments complex was down approximately $100,000 in projected revenue, YWCA management said.

Dillon and Ryals said they began looking closer at paperwork associated with the Wear to Live Apartment Apartments rent ledgers and noticed numerous discrepancies.

A meeting with Linda Hall, the YWCA director of housing development and housing operations, and Irwin Batara, YWCA director of human services, was eventually set with Koppisch at the Seattle YWCA office on Jan. 24, 2011, to discuss the inconsistencies they uncovered.

According to the police report, Koppisch confessed to taking money from renters who paid in cash, accepting and cashing money orders from renters which were left blank in the payee section, and changing names on money orders given to her by renters and cashing them.

Hall said that during the meeting, she took notes on notebook paper of the conversation they had with Koppisch so it could be used as a confession of theft.

Hall and Batara said Koppisch then signed the notes/statement. In the statement, Koppisch confessed to a variety of acts including crossing out names on money orders, signing up roommates as single renters, and keeping cash rent payments.

Koppisch's job with the YWCA was terminated in January 2011.

After an investigation that detectives said showed numerous deposits of money orders into Koppisch’s bank accounts and other evidence of theft and forgery, Koppisch was arrested on theft and multiple counts of forgery.

KIRO