Carolyn Sue Alderman-Connon, 46, was sentenced March 25 to 30 months in prison for embezzling from the Southeast Area Joint Apprenticeship Committee (SAJAC) in Ruskin, Florida. She was also ordered to serve three years of supervised release and pay $1,281,270.33 in restitution. The court also adopted an order of forfeiture of her assets.
Alderman-Connon was employed as a financial secretary by the Taft-Hartley Trust that provides apprentice training for Boilermakers in the Southeast. Her duties included verifying invoices and writing checks for the organization, recording and making bank deposits, entering various financial transactions into its electronic accounting system, and preparing bank reconciliation reports.
United States Attorney Robert E. O’Neill said Alderman-Connon used an online banking system to transfer funds between various apprenticeship program bank accounts, and then created and printed checks to either herself or a fictitious payee. Later she would access the bookkeeping system to change the payee’s names and conceal her theft.
SAJAC trains about 1,600 apprentices using about 35 part-time instructors. Alderman-Connon’s criminal activities came to light when a union member working for the apprentice program noticed suspicious transactions. Subsequent investigations by the U.S. Departments of Labor and Justice uncovered the ongoing theft.
