Woman charged with embezzling from church

A Craven County woman has been charged with embezzling nearly $100,000 from a church in Pollocksville while she directed its day-care center.

Vickie Lynn Price, 52, of River Bend, faces seven counts of embezzling from Pollocksville Presbyterian Church in Jones County. Price has a New Bern postal address, but she lives on Rockledge Road in River Bend, a town just south of the city.

Price is charged with embezzling $99,096 from the Pollocksville church during an 11-year period from 1996 to 2007.

She had directed its day-care center for 14 years before resigning in April. Warrants against Price were taken out about two weeks ago.

"I think ‘shock' is a good word for what we're feeling," said Jay Bender, a spokesman for the church. "I don't know many people who wouldn't be shocked at something like this."

Bender said church leaders found "financial inconsistencies" as they were doing budget work in August or September 2007, planning for the year ahead. Bender is the clerk of the session - the governing body of the congregation.

"The center had been showing some declines ... and there was a question about, ‘Why aren't we doing better?'" Bender said Wednesday. "It wasn't that we were looking to make money -but we were at least hoping to break even. We were in a situation of having to help the day care with money from other areas, and there were some issues with that."

Bender said the church got legal advice after the financial problems were noticed, and the matter was referred to District Attorney Dewey Hudson, whose district includes Jones County. Hudson called in the State Bureau of Investigation.

"The church has provided our records and has cooperated fully with the SBI," Bender said.

Bender said church members were told about the charges against Price on Sunday during an already-scheduled congregational meeting.

He said Price had resigned her position in April, saying that she wanted to spend more time with family and take care of some health problems.

Assistant District Attorney Bob Roupe is handling the case. He said Wednesday that he has not yet had an opportunity to talk to the SBI investigator on the case.

He said it will probably be at least a month before the SBI report on the case is complete.