Allegedly getting creative with traffic tickets in Palm Beach leads to charges against court employee

People intent on stealing often come up with creative ways to do it and a Palm Beach deputy clerk of court allegedly came up with a (temporarily) workable scheme involving traffic tickets. The Florida Dept. of Law Enforcement says Lucille Gomez Dunaway, 38, of South Bay, faces charges for allegedly diverting more than $12,000 from traffic ticket payments for personal use. Dunaway was charged with one count of official misconduct, one count of grand theft and one count of organized scheme to defraud. Dunaway, who was terminated for gross misconduct on Sept. 21, 2007, from employment at the Belle Glade office of the Clerk of the Court, was arrested by Jackson County sheriff’s deputies on a warrant on March 13 and was transported to the Jackson County Jail.

In September, 2007, officials in the County Clerk’s office researched a discrepancy between their computer records and state Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles (DHSMV) records. FDLE says, "An ensuing investigation alleged that Dunaway misappropriated funds used to pay traffic fines between April and September, 2007."

Investigators think they've figured out how the money was diverted. In the scheme, people paying the traffic tickets were not given an official receipt. Instead, Dunaway allegedly would hit “print screen” before entering the cash payment into the computer system and would give that document to the payee as a receipt. She then allegedly would clear the computer screen and not enter the cash transaction. About 100 people are believed to have been affected by the scheme.

Agents alleged that Dunaway also would falsify computer records in the computer system to show that a judge had waived all the fines, making it so the computer system would not expect a payment on the traffic violation. To do so, agents said Dunaway allegedly had to enter false information into the state’s DHSMV system and the county clerk’s system.

In about a dozen instances, Dunaway’s actions reportedly caused some drivers to have suspended driver’s licenses when the information was not entered into the state’s DHSMV system, according to investigators. When the mistake was uncovered, Dunaway allegedly would go into the computer system and clear the suspension by altering records.

Anyone with information on the case is asked to call FDLE’s Palm Beach Field Office at (561)640-2840.

(FDLE news release, edited, March 18, 2008)

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