A Union County jury has returned guilty verdicts on several charges filed against a former Plainfield Police Sergeant who exploited her position to further a scheme to steal money from the City and citizens of Plainfield by falsifying work records in order to fraudulently obtain unearned pay, Union County Prosecutor William A. Daniel announced today.
According to Prosecutor Daniel, Leslie Knight, 51, of Plainfield was found guilty Tuesday of theft by deception and falsifying records. The jury found her not guilty on one count of official misconduct and six additional counts of theft.
An investigation revealed that for an eighteen-month period between 2012 and 2013, Knight "purposely submitted false requests for overtime and extra-duty job payments that overlapped with each other, and also with her regular duty hours, resulting in her pocketing double and sometimes triple payments from the City of Plainfield for the same hours," according to Assistant Prosecutors Robert Rosenthal and Christopher Desimone who prosecuted the case.
According to Assistant Prosecutors Rosenthal and Desimone, the value of the thefts for which Knight was found guilty amounted to more than $1,100.
Prosecutor Daniel stated that Knight was initially charged in September of 2014 and indicted by a Union County Grand Jury in August of the following year.
In 2019, Knight pled guilty to a disorderly person's offense, agreed to forfeit her public employment and pay restitution.
According to Prosecutor Daniel, Knight later successfully moved to withdraw her guilty plea, and the matter was set for trial. Knight had been was suspended without pay while awaiting the outcome of the case.