A former Miles Home Healthcare office worker has pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor charge of theft.
Charlene Hall, 31, Bristol, entered the plea, but the amount of money missing from the health care unit is disputed.
Damariscotta Police Chief Drake said the amount is somewhere between $5000 and $2000.
“When the theft was discovered in March 2007, we believed about $5000 was missing. Earlier this month, during a three-day hearing in Lincoln County Superior Court, Hall’s lawyer, Susan Page argued a later audit showed about $2000 was gone,” Drake said.
Drake said Hall worked as a payroll/clinical support assistant, at a clinic where some patients paid in cash. A check of the clinic’s records showed no cash deposits had been made for a year.
“At first, she said she was not stealing the money, she said it was mismanagement. When she was arrested she had more than $973 in her desk drawer,” Drake said.
Justice Andrew M. Horton took the plea under advisement and will issue a ruling and sentence at a later date, said Ben Dyer, a deputy district attorney.
Scott Shott, Miles vice president of development and community relations, said office procedures have been changed in an attempt to prevent similar events.
Shott said privacy laws bar him from revealing whether she had been fired. “I can tell you she is no longer employed at the facility,” he said.
