A former employee at the Tennessee State Museum was arraigned Wednesday on allegations she stole more than $60,000 from the museum, reports The Tennessean.
Kathy L. Alexander, 60, was indicted on charges of theft of more than $60,000, forgery, identity theft and using a computer to commit fraud. She was arraigned by Nashville Criminal Court Judge Seth Norman on Wednesday.
Alexander is in custody and has been declared indigent. Her attorney, Kerry Haymaker, pleaded not guilty on her behalf.
Alexander was working for a staffing agency when she began at the museum in 2011. She was on parole for stealing from another organization at the time. Davidson County court records show she stole more than $43,000 by depositing company checks into a bank account in 2000 and 2001 while working as an office manager for Habitat for Humanity.
…In August 2014, the Tennessee Comptroller of the Treasury issued a report about the theft from the museum…. The comptroller’s report describes a scheme in which the unidentified employee created fake invoices for historical artifacts. She allegedly used her son’s name as the seller of the artifacts.
The report also noted that museum leadership should do more oversight of purchasing, finding that the woman, now identified as Alexander, had sole authority to review those purchases.