LAKEWOOD, Wash. — A catholic school volunteer charged with stealing more than $27,000 from a fundraiser program said she took the money to feed her children, records show.
The 42-year-old is charged with first-degree theft. She is scheduled to be arraigned July 20.
The volunteer ran a fundraiser for St. Francis Cabrini School in Lakewood where people buy gift cards and a percentage of each purchase benefits the school.
After the school principal started asking questions about why the fundraiser wasn’t making the usual amount of money, the volunteer allegedly resigned.
The school then launched an investigation.
It found that from July 2017 to April, the volunteer bought more than $27,000 worth of gift cards through the program but did not pay for them.
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When confronted, the volunteer said she’d recently lost her job and her husband and was desperate to take care of her children.
She said the “program made it too easy” to steal and her kids were hungry, according to charging papers.
Click here to read the full story on the Tacoma News Tribune.