The first of many hearings took place in Lima Municipal Court this Tuesday in connection with a case that dates back over 15 years in the city.
Susan Barnett pleaded guilty to Theft in Office and Communications Fraud back in 2019. Records state that in her role as clerk of courts as far back as 1997, Barnett was stealing money that was due to defendants in garnishments and/or bankruptcy cases, depositing it into her own accounts, and then falsifying records.
Restitution hearings have begun in Lima Municipal Court in order to return the stolen money to the victims in the case.
"We will make due process... and the people of this county ought to be mad as hell because of what she did, " said Magistrate Richard Warren. "The time that we put in this to try to make right for the people that are entitled to the money."
A total of $334,270 dollars has been ordered to be paid in restitution to more than eleven hundred victims. A large amount of that total belongs to what the court says is the biggest victims in the case, the City of Lima.
"To put it in the big picture, the $334,000, a large amount of that is City of Lima money. They are the biggest victim," said Jim Link, Lima Municipal Clerk of Courts. "We got about $250,000 who we are paying out to other people."
Magistrate Warren states that this process could take all the way to April of 2022, due to the amount of victims in the case. The court will also schedule additional hearings if necessary if the victims in the case have additional matters to discuss when their money was taken from them.
Link states that his fellow court officials helped make this entire process possible, and further explains that the process is necessary in order to do what is right by the victims in the case.
"About a quarter million was stolen from real people, real money," Link explained. "The key point is none of these victims knew they had money coming. They didn't know it was stolen from them. It was concealed so well in the clerks office years ago."
