Copyright The Philadelphia Inquirer
A Germantown woman turned herself in Wednesday after allegedly stealing more than $61,000 from the Philadelphia School District, authorities said. Over nine years, Laurel Schullere, mother of two children, told the district that a business called Missing Pieces would deliver the therapeutic services her children require, Pennsylvania Attorney General Dave Sunday said. Schullere collected $61,000 from the school system to pay for services, the attorney general’s office said, but did not inform the district that she owned the business and pocketed the payments. An investigation yielded no evidence that Missing Pieces — which listed two addresses, one associated with an abandoned property and another to an unrelated church — was actually operational, Sunday said in a statement. “This defendant exploited a system designed to help her own children grow and succeed,” Attorney General Sunday said. “Instead of ensuring the children received the care they needed, the defendant misled the district and pocketed taxpayer dollars.” Schullere has been charged with two counts of theft by deception. Attempts to contact Schullere Wednesday were not immediately successful.
