Store clerk charged with embezzling $53,000

A Springfield convenience store clerk is being blamed for more than $50,000 worth of lost inventory, police said.

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www.rutlandherald.com/article/20151205/NEWS02/151209730

ed December 5, 2015 in the Rutland Herald Store clerk charged with embezzling $53,000 By ERIC FRANCIS CORRESPONDENT WHITE RIVER JUNCTION — A Springfield convenience store clerk is being blamed for more than $50,000 worth of lost inventory, police said. Allison O’Connor, 28, allegedly told police she used the cash register at Jake’s Market & Deli on Clinton Street in Springfield to fuel a heroin habit that was “out of control.” O’Connor, who does not have a previous criminal record, pleaded innocent this week to a felony count of embezzlement, which carries a potential penalty of up to 10 years in prison. Springfield Detective Sgt. Patrick Call said the fraud first came to light in April, but it took another three months for managers at Jake’s to complete an internal investigation and contact police. Copies of company messages in court documents show Jake’s representative Bruce Bergeron contacting local managers in late April with an email that began, “I hope you are sitting down ...” A review of the inventory at the Springfield store at that time showed $24,000 worth of merchandise appeared to be missing, the email said. “I know it seems impossible, but we cannot find any clerical mistakes,” Bergeron wrote. “I have a terrible feeling something very bad is going on, and there are probably multiple people involved.” Call said the managers reviewed video tapes and narrowed their focus to O’Connor, who they said appeared to be “skimming” the cash register with the aid of the calculator on her cellphone. “O’Connor was targeting the customers that paid with cash,” Call wrote in his affidavit. “She would ring up the items that they were going to purchase and, upon determining that cash was going to be used for payment, she would then void out all items after receiving the total ...” She would then enter a sale for a small, cheap item, he said. To complete the scheme, the detective said, O’Connor removed the exact amount of cash that had been “voided” from the register before any deposit bags were put in the safe. O’Connor told police she started taking cash last fall and would pocket several hundred dollars at a time, the affidavit said. She was fired at the end of July. She admitted to a heroin habit of 25 to 30 bags a day, police said. Jake’s experienced a total loss of about $53,000, the affidavit said.