AUSTINTOWN Aide pleads guilty to stealing money from school cafeteria

She stole money by slipping $10 and $20 bills into a bag under a table.
YOUNGSTOWN -- An Austintown woman pleaded guilty Thursday to stealing $25,000 in lunch money from the school where she worked as a cafeteria aide.
Prosecutors will recommend that Terri L. Wolfe be placed on probation when she is sentenced later by Judge Maureen A. Cronin of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court.
They also will ask Judge Cronin to order Wolfe to pay back all the money she stole.
Wolfe, 43, of North Navarre Avenue, was indicted earlier this year for three counts of theft in office, each count a fifth-degree felony. As part of an agreement with prosecutors, she pleaded guilty to one count, which was amended to a fourth-degree felony.
Assistant Prosecutor Kelly Johns said Wolfe has no prior criminal record, which is why she recommended probation.
"And if we put her in prison, there is no way she can pay back the money," Johns said.
Judge Cronin ordered that a background check be done on Wolfe before sentencing.
Johns said Wolfe stole money from the lunch fund at Frank Ohl Middle School in Austintown by taking $10 and $20 bills that students used to pay for lunch and slipping them into a bag under the table. The thefts happened between September 2002 and March 2003.
Wolfe worked at the school from 1997 until resigning earlier this year.