Neillsville Woman Charged with Theft of a Business After Stealing Over $170,000 from a Neillsville Business
Friday, April 29th, 2016 -- 12:48 PM
-A Neillsville woman has been charged with theft of a business setting for stealing over $170,000 from a Neillsville business.According to the criminal complaint, the owner of Russell’s of Neillsville, Bruce Rakestraw, contacted the Neillsville Police Department at the beginning of June of last year stating that he believed one of his employees, 59-year-old Donna LaValley, was stealing from his business by diverting funds from bank deposits based on a recent audit done by Bookkeeping Plus.
When LaValley was first confronted, she denied taking the money. However, after a few days, LaValley’s daughter tried contacting Rakestraw stating that her mother admitted taking the money and she wanted to have a meeting with him. When they held the meeting, LaValley did admit to taking the money to help pay for over $30,000 worth of medical expenses. When she was told that other employees went through deposits from 2015 and part of 2014 and discovered $11,500 and $20,000 was missing, she said “no way” and she didn’t believe the amount she had taken was that much. She also hoped that Rakestraw wouldn’t press charges against her.
After the Neillsville Police Department met with Bookkeeping Plus and talked with LaValley as well as the owner and other employees of Russell’s, it was determined that LaValley had taken over $165,468.90 from Russell’s deposits from May of 2010 to June of 2015. She also stole $4,598.37 between 2011 and June of 2015 by falsifying returns including a power cord 53 times. In total, she stole $170,067.27 from Russell’s of Neillsville. LaValley was been charged with one misdemeanor count of theft of a business setting and five felony counts of theft of a business setting. She has an initial appearance on May 13th and if convicted, and sentenced to the maximum amount, she could spend a total of 50 years and nine months in prison, pay a total of $135,000 in fines or both.
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