A church in my area has been hit by an embezzlement scandal. It particularly grieves me because I have a number of friends who worship there.
Basic details are that the business administrator is accused of embezzling between $720,000 and $960,000. He has been arrested and formally charged with several felonies. He has denied all charges. Reports in on-line media do not provide any details of how the alleged scheme was supposedly carried out. We wait while the judicial system resolves the accusations. In the meantime, if you are so moved, please pray for the leadership (who are quite distracted from their ministry, I would guess), the membership (who are probably hurt and angry), the accused, and his family (they are victims too).
More details in this article at the Church and School Embezzlement blog. Articles from the Daily Bulletin, the local paper for my community, are no longer available on-line.
Full disclosure: It is important to explain that I know nothing about this tragedy beyond what I have read on-line.
Sadly, Church Fraud is a very real concern, with potential risk from the outside as well as within. There are simple steps to increase the security of a church’s finances, but it is difficult to know where to start. I recently found out about a Christian Accounting firm that offers online tools and support for churches. They have some excellent resources as well as an online questionnaire that will determine whether a church is at risk. Their service is called Weeds in the Garden.
Thanks for the comment! I heartily recommend the book Weeds in the Garden. It is a superb resource. You can get a copy from NACBA. Also available from Amazon. At some point soon I plan to start having reviews of books on this blog. Weeds in the Garden is one of the resources I plan to discuss.
One of many strong points in the book is tips on how to get started on an organizational fraud assessment.
Each chapter has a few questions that can be used as superb discussion starters or a basic self-diagnostic.
Check out the web site and then get the book!
I’m still learning how to drive the blog software. Since I don’t YET know how to embed a URL inside a comment, here is the URL for the book:
http://weedsinthegarden.com/
Amazon you know. Here is the URL for NACBA:
http://www.nacba.net/Pages/Home.aspx
see separate post on this book here:
http://ulvog.wordpress.com/2010/09/14/weeds-in-the-garden-%e2%80%93-the-growing-danger-of-fraud-taking-root-in-the-church/