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Liberty teacher on paid leave following theft charge
LIBERTY
A Liberty kindergarten teacher is on paid administrative leave after a police investigation into money missing from the school and three missing Chromebooks.
Justina Hafely is a cheerleading coach for seventh-and eighth-grade students, according to a police report. She was in charge of collecting money for shoes, pom-poms and hair bows, which totaled $40 per cheerleader.
In September, she began sending cheerleaders home with forms detailing the cheerleading costs and competition fees.
Hafely requested that the school district order the cheerleading items, and she told a school official she would drop off the money she had collected Sept. 21. But the police report said that based on school records, the money was never deposited.
By October, the only money deposited for the team was money sent directly from the parents, leaving a large unpaid balance. The school began contacting parents of the team participants, and several parents confirmed in writing they sent cash payments, including one parent who sent a money order that was never cashed, the report said.
A school employee also discovered that three Chromebooks were missing from a cart in Hafely’s room. Using an administrative tool, he could see she logged on one of them since they went missing in August.
After asking her multiple times to return the Chromebooks, she turned one in and said she had another one at home. As of Nov. 19, she hadn’t returned the other Chromebook, the report said.
A school official filed a theft complaint, and police began investigating the missing money.
When police confronted Hafely, she told the officers that only one of eight cheerleaders paid the fees. But when police showed her the list of parents who confirmed they paid the fees, she admitted she received payments but said she had no idea what happened to the money.
Hafely told police she stopped looking for the money because there was enough money from last year to cover expenses.
When police searched her car Nov. 19, they found the money from the parents, along with three Chromebooks reported missing from the school.
Hafely told police that over a two-year period, she would take a Chromebook home for her kids to play with, but kept losing track of them.
Police also discovered that $30 given to Hafely from a kindergartner for school lunch money was never turned into the school.
At Hafely’s home, police found a handwritten ledger indicating who paid for the cheerleading items.
Hafely faces a misdemeanor charge of theft. Her court hearing is set for 10 a.m. Jan. 9 in Girard Municipal Court. She pleaded not guilty at her arraignment last week.
A spokeswoman for the school confirmed the teacher was put on paid administrative leave, and said it’s district policy not to comment on a case that is under investigation.