A former North Slope Borough Police Department employee has admitted to stealing more than $100,000 from the department's evidence room and to sometimes destroying the related case files, according to a plea agreement filed Friday in federal court.
Margaret Ann Solomon agreed to plead guilty to one count of interstate or foreign transportation of stolen property after she used some of the cash stolen to gamble online, "namely, slot games on Facebook," said the plea agreement that was signed Friday by Solomon, her attorney, the U.S. Attorney in Alaska and an assistant U.S. Attorney.
According to the plea agreement, Solomon worked for the North Slope Borough Police Department in Barrow from November 2006 until July 2012. From about January 2011 to June 2012, she and two others were assigned to work in the department's evidence room, and Solomon had control over the room every three or so weeks, the plea agreement said.
Solomon admitted to taking cash from evidence envelopes during the weeks she was assigned to work in the evidence room. Sometimes she would return the empty envelopes, sometimes she would discard or destroy the envelopes and sometimes she would even destroy the related case files, the plea agreement said.
A 2014 audit of the police department's evidence room, found that at least $207,563 had gone missing from the room and 82 evidence items "were missing money or were unaccounted for altogether," the plea agreement said.
Solomon admitted to stealing at least $109,623 and the plea agreement said she "had a gambling problem" at the time.
Solomon used some of the stolen cash to play pull tabs in Barrow. She also deposited the cash into her personal bank account linked to her PayPal account so she could transfer the money to Facebook and play online slot games. In 2011 and 2012, she transferred $82,062 to Facebook, the plea agreement said.
The total amount of cash Solomon stole remains unknown, according to the plea agreement. That's because she didn't keep track of it and the police department "had poor controls" for tracking evidence in the evidence room. "For example, during business hours, the evidence room was often left open and unattended by the assigned evidence custodian," the plea agreement said.
Solomon has not yet been sentenced. The maximum sentence she could receive includes 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine, according to the plea agreement.
Michael Aamodt, North Slope Borough interim mayor, said in a statement Friday that he was "deeply saddened" by the actions of the borough's former employee.
"These types of crimes are an affront to our system of justice and to the level of integrity that we expect from those entrusted to carry out these solemn responsibilities," he said. "The Borough is committed to devoting all of the resources necessary to ensure that these type of offenses never happen again."
John Boyle, borough director of government and external affairs, said Solomon resigned on her own in July 2012. A records clerk eventually discovered the missing evidence, he said. He said the crime went undetected for so long because of "inadequate internal controls and requisite evidence audits not being performed with regards to evidence handling."
Jonathan Owen worked as the borough's police chief for about six months starting in late January 2015. (He says that he was abruptly fired by former Mayor Charlotte Brower). Reached by phone Friday, Owen said the FBI investigation into the missing evidence had started before he took the job and continued while he was police chief.
Owen said when he arrived the department was "lax" and the lock on the safe in the evidence room didn't work. He said he hired a locksmith from Wasilla to fix it and limited the number of people who could access the evidence room. He said he was concerned about the impacts the tainted evidence could have.
"The issue you have is that someone has now threatened the integrity of the entire evidence system," he said. "So it's potentially a defense attorney's dream."
Boyle said that aside from the repaired safe, the department hired a consultant to perform an evidence inventory and assist with revamping its policies and procedures. He said internal policies were updated and the department is in the process of getting records and evidence management software.
He said no previous convictions had been appealed or overturned because of Solomon's actions. He said the police department gave copies of the case files that had missing evidence to the Alaska Department of Law "pending any requests for appeal."
"While Solomon may have destroyed hard copies of case files, she did not have access to the digital copies that are kept as a redundancy," he said.