HOT SPRINGS -- Prosecutors have withdrawn felony theft charges that were filed last year against a former Garland County District Court clerk accused of embezzling more than $40,000 from court deposits.
Donna Linda Schleeter, 51, was arrested Feb. 11, 2014, on two counts of theft of property more than $5,000, punishable by up to 10 years in prison, and released a short time later on $7,500 bond pending trial.
The charges were withdrawn by prosecutors "for further investigation," according to court documents filed Aug. 12.
Brent Miller, Schleeter's attorney, said Monday that his client "has maintained her innocence from the day she was relieved of her duties in February 2012 through February 2014, when she was arrested on these charges."
Miller said Schleeter was "more than pleased" with the decision to drop the charges against her.
"Presumably, the factors that led to the charges being dropped were well thought out, and this matter has reached its ultimate conclusion," he said.
Garland County Prosecuting Attorney Terri Harris said Monday that they could "conceivably" refile the charges against Schleeter, but "at this time I have a feeling there that there is a better than good chance she would be acquitted" with just the evidence now at hand.
"Some new information came to light that caused a problem with our being able to prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt," Harris said. "We had more than sufficient probable cause at the time to arrest her based on the documentation we had," she said, noting that prosecutors and investigators worked on the case for three years.
"It's always difficult in embezzlement cases where more than one person has access to the funds. All it would take would be one juror believing one of the other people may have done it, and there was no real way to get around that at trial. There were other people that could have just as easily taken it, and that creates a problem."
According to the affidavit, on Feb. 16, 2012, chief court clerk Vickie Asher reported as stolen two cash deposits totaling $41,148.76, including $21,432.26 on Feb. 7 and $19,716.50 on Feb. 10.
Asher said Summit Bank notified her Feb. 15, 2012, that one of two deposits taken there was short by $1. The deposit that was incorrect was dated Feb. 6 for $19,394.19. The other deposit dated Feb. 14 for $30,270.50 was correct.
Asher checked the deposit slips and verified the shortage. She then checked the court's deposit ledger and discovered that the Feb. 6 deposit should have been made the previous week.
At that point, Asher, senior deputy clerk Cindy Wilson and then-court administrator Jason Lawrence conducted an audit and discovered the Feb. 7 and 10 deposits should have also been made but weren't. They were filled out in the deposit book but had not been deposited at the bank.
They searched the offices and safe but could not locate the missing deposits, so they spoke with Schleeter, the clerk "responsible for putting the deposits together every morning and putting them in the safe to be deposited," the affidavit said.
They said Schleeter reported that she could not tell them why the deposits were made out of order or what happened to the missing deposits, the affidavit said.
A complete audit was conducted by the court and the Hot Springs Finance Department, which revealed that discrepancies began to appear in the sequences in which the deposits were made in the middle of 2011.
On 37 separate occasions between June 2011 and Feb. 15, 2012, deposits were held back and made several days later than they should have been.
The audit also confirmed that money from Feb. 7 and Feb. 10 was taken in and deposit slips created, but they never made it to the bank.
State Desk on 08/18/2015