Wikinews

Illinois tollway worker jailed for stealing fines

This is the stable version, checked on 9 August 2020. Template changes await review.

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Related articles
Location of Illinois
Collaborate!
Illinois
Illinois
Chicago Skyway toll plaza in Chicago

A former employee of the Illinois State Toll Highway Authority was sentenced on Monday to one year in prison for stealing fines from the agency.

Thirty-four-year-old Uganda T. Harris from Bellwood was accused of embezzling over $36,000 from the tollway authority in a period of six months. She pleaded guilty to the charges in June. She is to report to the DuPage County jail on November 30 to begin a one-year work-release program that only allows her out to work 40 hours per week. She will also serve four years of probation and will be required to pay the agency $1,000 for insurance coverage in addition to the more than $36,000 she allegedly stole.

Harris had worked as a customer service representative since June 2007. An audit by the tollway authority's inspector general's office revealed that she incorrectly classified the fines she collected as coming from I-PASS users, who pay lesser fines, and pocketed the cash. The Illinois State Police later caught Harris with $1,100 in marked $20-bills they used to pay a phony fine during an undercover investigation. She claimed that she did this only rarely and to help those people in desperate need of relief from what she saw as high tollway fines.


Sources

 

Share this:           


 

This page is archived, and is no longer publicly editable.

Articles presented on Wikinews reflect the specific time at which they were written and published, and do not attempt to encompass events or knowledge which occur or become known after their publication.

Got a correction? Add the template {{editprotected}} to the talk page along with your corrections, and it will be brought to the attention of the administrators.

Please note that due to our archival policy, we will not alter or update the content of articles that are archived, but will only accept requests to make grammatical and formatting corrections.

Note that some listed sources or external links may no longer be available online due to age.

  This page is archived, and is no longer publicly editable.
Articles presented on Wikinews reflect the specific time at which they were written and published, and do not attempt to encompass events or knowledge which occur or become known after their publication.

Got a correction? Add the template {{editprotected}} to the talk page along with your corrections, and it will be brought to the attention of the administrators.

Please note that due to our archival policy, we will not alter or update the content of articles that are archived, but will only accept requests to make grammatical and formatting corrections.

Note that some listed sources or external links may no longer be available online due to age.


Retrieved from "https://en.wikinews.org/w/index.php?title=Illinois_tollway_worker_jailed_for_stealing_fines&oldid=2714930"