A Gloucester County woman was sentenced to three years in state prison Friday after admitting she stole nearly $150,000 from a Mount Laurel law firm, where she worked as the bookkeeper and office manager.
Kathy McKinlay, 39, of Swedesboro, previously pleaded guilty to theft by deception in Superior Court in Mount Holly, acknowledging that she had diverted $149,857 of the firm’s money into her own accounts.
“As we have come to understand, her major issue was gambling,” Burlington County Assistant Prosecutor Andrew McDonnell said in the Burlington County Courthouse. “Hopefully, while in prison, she will get some help and address some of her mental health issues.”
In addition to the prison term, Judge James W. Palmer Jr. ordered McKinlay to pay full restitution to the victim, David Apothaker of Apothaker & Associates PC, or his insurance company if the losses have already been covered.
“He was only out $500,” McKinlay said in court, telling the judge the restitution should go to the insurance company.
The Fellowship Road law firm focuses on consumer collections in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. The defendant worked there for a few years, admitting she stole the money on various dates between 2009 and 2011.
McKinlay, formerly of Folcroft, Pa., wrote dozens of checks to herself, putting in the memo field “court costs” and then using the ill-gotten money to gamble at the Showboat and Resorts casinos in Atlantic City, and Harrah’s in Chester, Pa.
She manipulated the law firm’s computer system to try to cover her theft, according to court documents.
Public defender Wendy Moragne asked the judge to consider that McKinlay was willing to pay restitution, even though she has a limited income, and that the theft was her first contact with the criminal justice system.
“And last,” noted the defendant, who could be released from prison in as little as three months if she is accepted into the state’s Intensive Supervision Program, which allows nonviolent inmates to be released early under strict parole conditions.
Kathy McKinlay, 39, of Swedesboro, previously pleaded guilty to theft by deception in Superior Court in Mount Holly, acknowledging that she had diverted $149,857 of the firm’s money into her own accounts.
“As we have come to understand, her major issue was gambling,” Burlington County Assistant Prosecutor Andrew McDonnell said in the Burlington County Courthouse. “Hopefully, while in prison, she will get some help and address some of her mental health issues.”
In addition to the prison term, Judge James W. Palmer Jr. ordered McKinlay to pay full restitution to the victim, David Apothaker of Apothaker & Associates PC, or his insurance company if the losses have already been covered.
“He was only out $500,” McKinlay said in court, telling the judge the restitution should go to the insurance company.
The Fellowship Road law firm focuses on consumer collections in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. The defendant worked there for a few years, admitting she stole the money on various dates between 2009 and 2011.
McKinlay, formerly of Folcroft, Pa., wrote dozens of checks to herself, putting in the memo field “court costs” and then using the ill-gotten money to gamble at the Showboat and Resorts casinos in Atlantic City, and Harrah’s in Chester, Pa.
She manipulated the law firm’s computer system to try to cover her theft, according to court documents.
Public defender Wendy Moragne asked the judge to consider that McKinlay was willing to pay restitution, even though she has a limited income, and that the theft was her first contact with the criminal justice system.
“And last,” noted the defendant, who could be released from prison in as little as three months if she is accepted into the state’s Intensive Supervision Program, which allows nonviolent inmates to be released early under strict parole conditions.
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