Episcopal Press and News

Embezzlement Stuns North Carolina Parish

Episcopal News Service. October 17, 1996 [96-1587B]

(ENS) The 150-year-old parish, Chapel of the Cross in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, recently reported the embezzlement of $480,000 by the parish's financial secretary Brian Patrick Mullaney. Beginning in 1993, Mullaney devised a scheme to siphon off donations before they were deposited so that neither bank employees nor annual auditors detected the theft. He was arrested on August 1 and released on $25,000 bond posted by his mother. He pleaded guilty and will be sentenced this fall. Parish attorney Sydenham Alexander Jr. said that $60,000 was recovered from insurance policies but that all the embezzled money is already spent. Mullaney is expected to be ordered to make restitution over a period of years.