Fiddling Timecards: Almost Always A Bad Idea

It was reported recently that a former Akron, Ohio police captain was convicted of theft and evidence tampering.

What makes this story notable is the fact that the officer was a woman, and with all her experience must have thought she could get away with it. She'll do ten days in jail and have a suspended sentence and the eternal scarlet letter of conviction of an offense of moral turpitude on her record. Whether she gets to keep her pension is unknown.

Apparently the scheme was that she'd doctored her work schedule so as to get paid when she wasn't on duty. I guess the $75,000 annual salary was not enough.

The takehome's quite obvious: never doctor timecards or steal from your employer-it doesn't matter what everyone else does or what other folks say they've gotten away with, and it almost always ends badly.