Published: Saturday, July 21, 2007
Trumbull court employee faces theft-in-office charge
The 36-year-old Cortland woman is accused of stealing over $5,000 from the court's auto title division.
WARREN — The Trumbull County Prosecutor's Office has charged a 17-year employee of the county Clerk of Court's auto title division with stealing $5,314.09 from the office since February.
Stella Coletti, 36, of Deer Creek Trail, Cortland, was arrested in Cortland and charged with theft in office, a third-degree felony, Friday afternoon.
She posted $5,000 bond and was released.
Chris Becker, an assistant county prosecutor, said Clerk of Courts Karen Infante Allen and her staff discovered the alleged thefts July 11 and reported them to the prosecutor's office, which called for help from the forensic accounting division of Ohio Attorney General Marc Dann's office, the Trumbull County Sheriff's Department and the Ohio State Highway Patrol.
State investigators assisted because some of the money allegedly stolen was state money, Becker added.
Investigators think Coletti accepted checks and cash from the public and was stealing some of the money, Becker said.
Becker added that Coletti was charged on a prosecutor's complaint and has not been indicted. She will be arraigned at 1 p.m. Monday in common pleas court before Judge John M. Stuard.
Becker said Leo Fernandez of the attorney general's office said Allen and her office "did a great job" in finding the alleged thefts, noting that Coletti was "charged nine days after it [the alleged thefts] was discovered."
If convicted of the charge, she could be sentenced to one to five years in prison, Becker said.
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