A former Clay Middle School employee accused of stealing nearly $95,000 from the school in cash and unauthorized purchases received a two-year sentence July 18 and is ordered to make restitution payments.
Aletta Nowlin of Carmel pleaded guilty to corrupt business influence and official misconduct. As part of the plea, Hamilton County Judge Jonathan Brown dismissed 18 counts of theft.
Nowlin was an administrative assistant at Clay Middle School from July 2012 until her termination in 2021. She also served as the building treasurer.
According to court documents, school officials became aware of the missing funds in 2021 after being asked to run financial reports to explore the COVID-19 pandemic’s financial losses on the school’s athletic department funds. It states that Nowlin was “unable to explain or justify” errors and inaccuracies identified in the report.
The affidavit states that nearly $75,000 in cash was found to be missing from the Athletic Fund, Music Fund and Make-A-Wish Foundation Fund within the CMS Extracurricular Activities Account between April 10, 2019, and March 1, 2021. During that same time frame, nearly $20,000 in unauthorized purchases were made on a Sam’s Club credit card.
According to the affidavit, Nowlin told investigators that she used cash for personal gain rather than depositing it into the ECA account, and she admitted that she used the school’s Sam’s Club credit card for her own personal use “quite a bit” to buy groceries and items for her children. The affidavit states that unauthorized purchases on the credit card include jewelry, makeup, household items, gasoline, gift cards and more.
In November 2023, Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita filed a lawsuit against Nowlin that stated she caused CMS to suffer a pecuniary loss of $205,002 between 2016 and 2021. The case is pending.
