Law enforcement officials say recovering money lost at Northwest Florida schools ‘won’t be easy’

ESCMBIA COUNTY, Fla. – WEAR News is following the news of an Escambia County school employee facing several charges after investigators say the bookkeeper stole more than $50,000 from Ernest Ward Middle School.

Sheriff’s office says 41-year-old Lindsey Kelley stolen from more than a dozen departments at the school, and investigators have reason to believe the theft goes further than that.

WEAR News spoke with school board members Friday who shared a history of accounting problems at Northwest Florida schools.

Escambia County School Board members told WEAR News the matter is in the hands of law enforcement and they hope through the courts that much, if not all, of this money can be recovered quickly. But as WEAR News learned from the sheriff, that could be a difficult task.

Escambia County School Board member David Williams told WEAR News it’s difficult to detect potential fraud in schools until it’s too late. Williams, a former school principal, said he is surprised to see the discrepancies have gone on for more than a year without action.

According to the report, a 2022 audit of the school district revealed that Kelley’s “lack of organization led to several problems, the most serious of which was the inability to locate complete records for deposits and receipts.”

“Sometimes things fall through the cracks,” Williams said. “The fact that it’s going on for so long is concerning to me because we have to clean up audits and other things, and go back and find certificates of deposit, and make sure that the checks and balances are in place by the end of the school year.”

“I was fortunate to have great bookkeepers as administrators, and they kept me informed of any issues we could have corrected that year,” he said. “It took less than two to three years before we discovered the violation.”

Earlier this week, it was announced that a similar investigation was underway by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement in Santa Rosa County.

Kelly Short resigned in late October after the school district said an investigation revealed she was “involved in financial irregularities.”

Santa Rosa County Schools say all purchases must be approved by the school or department administrator, and audits are conducted once a year by outside agencies.

Although FDLE says the investigation is active, Short is not currently facing charges.

In the past two years alone, WEAR News has covered at least a half-dozen cases of accountants accused of stealing money. Four of these were school accountants.

When he spoke with Sheriff Chip Simmons this week, he too said this has happened to organizations he was involved with.

“Unfortunately, I’ve been there and seen things like this before,” Simmons said. “I used to run youth league baseball parks and every now and then you have people who are dealing with cash that can’t count properly or deliberately can’t count properly, so there’s money missing. So you have to have a lot of internal controls.”

As for recovering lost money, Sheriff Simmons said it won’t be easy. But he says the sheriff’s office will explore all options to repay the money, including interviewing those who received money from Kelly.

In many cases, the sheriff said a judge could order defendants like Lindsey Kelley to return to work and garnish her wages until the debts are paid in full.

The sheriff said she is still investigating whether additional crimes were committed.