APACHE – A former Town Hall employee was arraigned July 3 on two felony charges of embezzlement of public money, and is scheduled to face a jury trial in Caddo County District Court on Nov. 18.
Kelly Lynn Lunsford, 45, of Apache, is accused of stealing town funds on two occasions last July. She was fired from her job, and the town’s financial records subsequently were audited by Furrh and Associates of Lawton, Mayor Dakota Woods told Southwest Ledger.
Lunsford listed an address in Lubbock, Texas, when she was released from custody on a $5,000 personal-recognizance bond in January. She is scheduled to return to Caddo County District Court on Dec. 21.
Lunsford initially was charged last October with two misdemeanors, but the case was upgraded to felony counts on Jan. 30, 2024.
She is alleged to have pocketed $280 that a town resident paid July 25 on his utility bill, and $108 that another customer paid on July 21 for the impoundment of her dog and a one-day boarding fee, Apache Police Officer Ben Lehew related in a probable-cause affidavit.
Town Clerk Gena Montgomery reported that records of those transactions were not found on the town’s computer system. Lehew reported that he examined the town’s ledgers and found “no evidence to indicate that these funds” were deposited into the town’s General Fund account “or any other account” at the Shamrock Bank branch in Apache.
Apache Police Chief Brynn Barnett contacted the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation on Aug. 1, 2023, and asked them to join the investigation.
An OSBI agent conducted “formal oral interviews” two days later of Montgomery, Lunsford, and Connie Frazier, a newly hired part-time town employee who accepted the money tendered in both transactions.
Montgomery and Frazier completed their interviews. However, after approximately one hour the interview with Lunsford “was abruptly halted” when she invoked her Miranda rights, Lehew wrote.
Frazier subsequently underwent a polygraph examination by an OSBI “trained examiner’ on Aug. 16 and “was cleared of any further inquiry into her part in this matter.”