HOBART – Hearings for two former officials in Lone Wolf’s Town Hall are scheduled soon in Kiowa County District Court before Associate District Judge Rick Marsh.
Margrett Mae Horton, 57, of Lone Wolf, the former office manager, and co-defendant Bonnie Charlene Keesee, 51, of Sentinel, the town’s former clerk/treasurer, are both named in two felony counts of embezzlement. Both women pleaded not guilty and are free on bond.
A preliminary hearing conference for Horton was held Aug. 17 and was continued to Oct. 19 “for waiver of preliminary hearing and plea,” a court record shows.
Keesee’s preliminary hearing conference on Aug. 29 was continued to Sept. 14, court records reflect.
District Attorney David Thomas and Assistant D.A. Daniel Jacobsma filed embezzlement charges against the women earlier this year in the wake of two audits.
Horton is accused of embezzling $17,524 from municipal coffers by placing her two dependent children on the town’s health insurance program between July 1, 2015, and Dec. 3, 2017.
The town’s code of ordinances did not provide for paid health insurance for family members of employees. Additionally, minutes of Board of Trustees and Public Works Authority meetings over a 10-year period, from January 2008 through December 2017, did not reflect approval of dependent health insurance coverage.
Horton “admitted that she purchased the insurance for her children” without obtaining approval from the town trustees, State Auditor and Inspector Cindy Byrd wrote last year in her report on the audit of Lone Wolf’s municipal government.
Keesee and Horton are named jointly in a charge accusing them of embezzling $2,300 from the sale of fireworks purchased for the town’s annual Independence Day celebration: $1,500 in 2015 and $800 in 2016.