St. Ignatius woman accused of forgery, felony theft
Annie Morigeau, 33, of St. Ignatius, was arrested through cooperation between St. Ignatius Police and Lake County Sheriff’s Departments Monday, July 29, on charges of felony forgery and felony theft.
Sheriff Don Bell said in a press release that Morigeau served as secretary for the St. Ignatius Firefighters Auxiliary Board, a volunteer organization that supports the St. Ignatius Volunteer Fire Department with community donations and fundraisers.
Morigeau also served as treasurer of the fire department’s accounts.
In court documents filed July 24 by Deputy Lake County Attorney Ben Morigeau, Morigeau is accused of taking at least $59,801.16 from fire department accounts without authority, and endorsing and cashing $1,100 of checks received through fire department fundraising efforts but failing to deposit the funds in a fire department account from December 2, 2016 through May 22, 2019.
Though not authorized to have a debit card on the checking account, charging documents allege Morigeau repeatedly used a debit card to make unauthorized withdrawals of funds from that account, wrote checks to pay personal bills from the account, and made $7,200 in withdrawals from the St. Ignatius Fire Department savings account.
In addition, cashing the checks required two signatures, but the person whose signature appeared as second signor had moved out of state and was not serving on the fire department board during at least part of the time his signature appeared on the checks cashed by Morigeau. Checks alleged to have forged second signatures total more than $5,000.
A $50,000 bond is proposed.