a day ago
Former Rock Creek School secretary ordered to serve 15 days in jail, pay restitution for theft scheme
A Frederick woman on Thursday was ordered to serve 15 days in jail and pay $23,800 in restitution to Frederick County Public Schools for stealing from the Student Activities Fund at Rock Creek School, where she worked.
Rebecca Mae Main, 65, pleaded guilty on March 6 to one count of theft scheme between $1,500 and $25,000. The theft scheme lasted from 2020 to 2023 while Main worked as an administrative secretary at the school.
Rock Creek School, a part of FCPS, provides individualized special education programs for students age 3 to 21 with severe intellectual, physical, emotional, hearing, visual and learning disabilities, according to its website.
Over the course of the theft scheme, prosecutors said, Main made out three dozen checks to herself and deposited them into her personal bank account.
The checks were supposedly reimbursements for money that Main spent on behalf of the school, but FCPS had no record of why the checks were sent, The Frederick News-Post previously reported.
During a hearing in Frederick County District Court on Thursday, Assistant State's Attorney Morgan McLaughlin said that, although Main had no prior criminal record, the theft scheme amounted to "a brazen and continuous course of conduct" that directly harmed the county's neediest students.
McLaughlin said Main's original sentencing hearing was postponed for 90 days to allow time for her to come up with money to repay the school system. He said he did not consider the $400 Main came prepared to pay on Thursday "a good faith" effort on that front.
According to McLaughlin, FCPS wanted to send a staff member to speak at the sentencing hearing on Thursday, but could not because it is so close to the end of the school year. He said the school system sent a letter instead.
FCPS acknowledged, but did not respond to, a request for comment about Main's case on Thursday.
Gabriella Farago, a public defender who represented Main at the sentencing hearing, said the theft scheme took place against the backdrop of severe medical issues and financial problems Main was having.
"Sometimes when bad things happen to us, we make the wrong choices," Farago said.
"I'm very sorry and I regret it," Main told the court on Thursday. "I'll do everything I have to to rectify this." She did not say anything more in her statement to the court.
Frederick County District Court Judge Eric Schaffer on Thursday said that while "everybody has financial issues, not everybody steals." He sentenced Main to five years in prison and suspended all but 15 days.
Schaffer also ordered Main to serve five years of supervised probation, but said she could file for early termination if she pays the full amount of restitution before then.
As a condition of her probation, Main will not be allowed to return to the Rock Creek school or to FCPS in general.
"You're going to see the inside of a jail cell for 15 days," Schaffer said.
"I want you to think about what you did," he continued. "I'll take a very dim view of you if you don't make these victims whole."
