FraudBaron.com

Phyllis Ann Chambers, 47, is accused of stealing the money from S.J. Denham between January 2004 and the end of July of this year, according to the complaint filed by the district attorney's office on Nov. 13. She is charged with one felony count of embezzlement and two related enhancements. Chambers, who is not considered to be a flight risk, was to turn herself in Wednesday night at the Shasta County jail in Redding, said Redding Police Investigator Rob Wilson. Chambers worked in S.J. Denham's finance department from July 2000 until she was fired in early August, according to an affidavit attached to a search warrant. Her duties included receiving the mail, bank statement reconciliation and accounts receivable, the affidavit said. She also made daily bank deposits, it added. A search warrant was served at Chamber's Flowers Lane home in October. That search resulted in the seizure of her computer, financial documents and other items, court documents said. Police also inspected her Tri-Counties Bank account information. The alleged thefts began to come to light in late July when an accounts payable clerk at the car dealership noticed an electronic transfer of $585.71 from the business to pay a Pacific Gas & Electric Co. bill, the affidavit said. Further investigation revealed that the funds went to pay Chambers' personal PG&E bill, it said. When later confronted about it, Chambers, who was fired that day, said that PG&E must have made a mistake. But S.J. Denham is on North Market Street in Redding, which receives power from Redding Electric Utility. The car dealership then began to further investigate areas in which Chambers was involved, which also led to an audit. Police interviewed S.J. Denham officials in early October to discuss their audit findings, the affidavit said. The audit disclosed that Chambers had written a number of personal checks that were deposited to the car dealership's account, the affidavit said. The amounts on the checks matched cash amounts that Chambers had received at the end of the day, it said. It is alleged that Chambers would remove the cash that she received and replace it by writing a personal check, it said, but the checks bounced. Chambers, who received the bank statements and checks, would pull out the bounced checks and try to cover up the loss through other means, the affidavit said. "There was a lot of effort to cover up" the alleged thefts, Dervin said. It's believed that Chambers, who reportedly has medical and financial problems, embezzled the money to pay living expenses, Wilson said. He said her husband had owned a trucking business that collapsed.