By Tracey Bruce
For the Leader
Angela Huskey, former business manager of the Grandview School District, is scheduled on Tuesday, Dec. 5, to turn herself in to the U.S. Marshals Service in St. Louis, and then begin serving her prison sentence, according to court documents.
After pleading guilty to mail fraud in connection with the embezzlement of more than $1.6 million from the Grandview R-2 School District, she was sentenced on Oct. 13 to 63 months in prison. She also was ordered to pay $1,813,900.63 in restitution, with $1,658,900.63 to go to the school district and another $155,000 to the Missouri United School Insurance Council, the district’s insurance provider.
The school district already has received a $454 check from Huskey that was sent through the federal court, Grandview Superintendent Matt Zoph said.
“Our attorney tells us a lot of her assets are still going through the (forfeiture) process,” he said.
Huskey has already liquidated many of her assets, selling property and handing over the funds to the court in order to begin reimbursing the district, according to a sentencing memorandum filed by Huskey’s attorney, Talmage E. Newton IV.
The property she sold included a 2006 Corvette, a 2015 Dodge 2500 diesel truck, a 2012 Cobalt Bow Ridge Boat, a 2010 Heartland North Country 26-foot camper, a 2015 Dodge Ram, a Ranger bass boat, a 2007 Yamaha gas golf cart, a utility trailer and her interest in a condominium in Kimberling City.
So far, the federal court has seized $250,162.23 from the proceeds of those liquidated assets, according to court documents.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office has filed a preliminary order of forfeiture and next the judge will file a final order of forfeiture, U.S. Attorney’s Office public affairs specialist Terri Dougherty said.
The money then will be deposited in an account and regular installments will be made to the school district and insurance company, she said.
While Huskey is incarcerated, she will pay 50 percent of any money she receives to the Bureau of Prisons’ Inmate Financial Responsibility Program, and that money will be used to reimburse the school district.
Then, when Huskey is released from prison, she will make monthly installments of at least $500 or at least 10 percent of her gross earnings, whichever is greater, according to the judgment in the case.
On Oct. 16, Huskey’s attorney filed a sentencing memorandum with the court asking that her sentence be commuted to 24 months of home confinement and 800 hours of community service.
As of Nov. 27, however, the 63-month sentence that U.S. District Judge Rodney W. Sippel handed down still stood.
The district’s insurance provider, which previously paid the district $155,000 in connection with the case, hasn’t decided whether it will cover the entire loss related to the theft, Zoph said.
“We have not been approved or denied, but we’re anticipating a verdict soon, and we’re very hopeful,” he said.
If the insurance company pays the district for the loss, then money Huskey pays in restitution will go to the insurance company, Zoph said.
As Grandview receives money from either the insurance company or Huskey, the district plans to deposit it in its general fund with a separate account code “so we can track it,” Zoph said.
He said the theft, along with the expenses for the audit and legal fees related to the theft, hurt the district.
“Our reserves were down to 4 1/2 percent (of the district’s annual budget of $7.5 million.) Three percent is a financially stressed district,” Zoph said.
This fall, the district had to borrow money to cover its bills while it waits for tax revenue to come in this winter, he said.
Zoph said the district’s goal is to put any money reimbursed into reserves until it has accumulated 20 percent of its annual budget.
He said 20 percent would be about $1.4 million or $1.5 million.
“It’s really a necessity for a district this small,” he said.
Zoph said Grandview is recovering from the trauma of learning a trusted employee had stolen so much and for so long.
“Things are getting back to normal” he said.
Zoph said new financial policies and procedures were put in place, like changing the way purchase orders were requested and processed. The district is “accounting for everything,” he said.
“It was a tough start,” Zoph said. “Change is hard, but it eventually becomes the way you do things. It’s getting to that point.”
He said morale in the school district also is improving.
“I was at a pep assembly the other day and a couple of teachers told me this was the best year they have had in a long time,” Zoph said.
Huskey began defrauding the school district and its employees as early as July 30, 2006.
She was a district employee since 1996 and was made the administrative assistant in 2002 and the business manager in 2009.