New York State Inspector General Catherine Leahy Scott today announced the arrest of a former State employee on charges she falsified and forged subpoenas and feigned court appearances enabling her to steal paid days off from her State job while awaiting her license to practice law.
Matoaka Aurora Thompson, 36, most recently with an address in Saratoga Springs, was arrested and charged today with Grand Larceny in the Fourth Degree, Criminal Possession of a Forged Instrument in the Second Degree and Offering a False Instrument for Filing in the First Degree, all felonies.
“This defendant brazenly concocted a scheme deceiving her employer and defrauding taxpayers to subsidize paid time off to which she was not entitled,” said Inspector General Leahy Scott. “I will continue using all of the resources at my disposal to pursue any public employee who falsifies documents in a fraud against the government.”
An investigation by Inspector General Leahy Scott found that Thompson, who was employed as a Legal Affairs Specialist with the State Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance (“OTDA”), repeatedly used fraudulent and forged subpoenas ordering her to court appearances and enabling her to take days off with pay instead. When she started work with OTDA in 2015, Thompson notified her Supervisors that she had an ongoing court case in Westchester County Family Court which she would need to attend. The investigation determined that Thompson was properly subpoenaed on several occasions for that case, which ended in October 2016, but found the subpoenas she provided to supervisors to justify nine separate paid days off between March and May 2017 were falsified and forged. The investigation determined that Thompson used the original 2016 subpoena documents, changed the dates on them and submitted them to her OTDA supervisors to justify her paid days off.
During the nine days Thompson used fraudulent subpoenas to justify time off, she received $1,482.30 in salary to which she was not entitled. Thompson had previously used almost all of her earned paid days off while studying for the New York State Bar Exam, which she took in early 2017, and did not otherwise have enough earned accruals for the nine days off she took using the fraudulent subpoenas.
Thompson was terminated from her position at OTDA during the investigation and her conduct was reported to the State court system’s Committee on Character and Fitness as her admission to the State Bar remains pending.
Thompson was arraigned today in Albany City Court and released pending her reappearance on March 23.
Inspector General Leahy Scott thanked OTDA for their assistance with the investigation, the New York State Police for their assistance with the arrest and Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman and his office for prosecuting this matter.
