A nun in California stole $ 800 in donations and lost them in a casino

Nun Mary Margaret Kroiper, who stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from a Catholic elementary school in Los Angeles and lost them gambling in Vegas, will read her penance in a federal prison cell, reports New York Post.

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Sister Mary Margaret Kroiper of Los Angeles was sentenced February 7 to one year and one day for fraud and money laundering. The 80-year-old nun was also ordered to pay a total of $825 in compensation for money she embezzled when she was principal of St. James Catholic School in Torrance, California.

Prosecutors said Kroiper, who served as headmaster for 28 years, diverted funds to pay expenses that her order, the Sisters of St. Joseph of Karondeletsky - would never have approved, including large gambling expenses associated with trips to casinos and credit card expenses that she made from 2008 to September 2018.

Kroiper, who apologized to the public at the time of her sentencing, also asked the judge for leniency.

"I have sinned, I have broken the law, and I have no excuse," Kroiper said during a February 7 hearing.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Poonam Kumar said the wayward nun loved gambling in Las Vegas, Tahoe, Temecula and other places throughout Southern California. According to Kumar, Kroiper even took other nuns with him on some of these excursions and spent elementary school money.
"One of the things she said when she first confronted the Archdiocese of Los Angeles and even before law enforcement got involved was that she did it in part because she believes priests are paid more than nuns." Kumar said.

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While Kroiper spent the school's funds on gambling, she kept asking her parents to donate more money to the school on top of their $6000 annual tuition.

“It really is a breach of trust, right,” Kumar said. — She was the director. She ran the school that these parents chose to send their children to, and not just for school. Many of the letters I quoted and many of the speakers said they wanted something more out of their children's education."

“They wanted a Catholic education with morals and values ​​that they believed in and lived by, and that's what they were looking for in school. So there were a significant number of parents who were very upset and clearly felt betrayed. Today there were parents who said that their children were no longer involved with the church,” he said.

In July, Kroiper pleaded guilty to the charges and also admitted to falsifying monthly and annual reports to school officials and forcing staff to cover up her fraudulent activities.

Kumar said that Kroiper managed to avoid detection for so many years because she transferred tuition checks and other funds to two old bank accounts that other school administrators didn't know about. While other checks were being cashed and accounted for properly, the fraudulent nun deposited other checks in secret bank accounts before they were even accounted for by staff.

“Basically, she could keep them a secret and the school administration didn’t know that she was taking these extra funds,” Kumar said.

Kumar added that the Kroiper scheme was exposed because the school conducted an unofficial review shortly after the nun announced she was stepping down as principal in 2018. It was then that Kroiper began to get nervous and told two employees to destroy the documents and told them not to mention to the auditors that some documents were missing.

The staff then reported Kroiper to the monsignor of the parish, as Kumar said.

Prosecutors asked for a two-year sentence, but U.S. District Judge Otis D. Wright II said at the Feb. 7 sentencing that he also struggled to find the proper punishment for the nun, and even said she was a "damn good teacher."

“You can be proud of that,” Wright said. “But somewhere along the line you just completely lost your way, and I think you understand it.” At least that's what I hope."

Defense attorney Mark Byrne said Kroiper joined the order when she was 18 and had been an educator for 54 years. He said that some former students of St. James Catholic School even wrote letters to the judge in support of their former teacher and principal.

“We've had a lot of letters from parents and students who knew that she took money, and presumably the money was taken from them, and yet they found it in their hearts to forgive her,” Byrne said. “They asked that she be judged on the basis of her entire life, and not on one theft from St. James (Catholic school). Sister Mary said she was very repentant and humbled. She broke the law, she has no excuse for it, and she takes full responsibility."

Byrne said that the Order of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Karondeletsky had already placed "some severe and burdensome" restrictions on Kruiper.

“She cannot leave the premises without permission and she must tell them where she is going and she must be accompanied by someone,” the lawyer said. “Basically, for the last three and a half years, she's been driving her sisters to doctor's appointments and things like that. So she’s basically under house arrest, which she accepts.”

Officials from the Archdiocese of Los Angeles said in a statement that school officials and others cooperated with the investigation.

“The Archdiocese informed authorities in 2018 when financial audits during a leadership transition revealed that a significant amount of school funds had been misappropriated for the personal use of Sister Mary Margaret during her tenure as principal,” church officials said. “The Archdiocese and St. James Parish and School are grateful to local and federal law enforcement for their work in investigating this matter.” We continue to offer our prayers for everyone affected by this matter."

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Kroiper has been released on bail but will have until June 7 to report to the Federal Bureau of Prisons to begin her one-year sentence. According to Kumar, after her release, she will be under observation for two years.

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