Northern Arizona University reported a fraud allegation to both its police department and the Office of the Auditor General suspected financial misconduct by Edwin Talley, former university postal services manager. The Auditor General’s Office determined that from July 1997 through January 2013, Talley used fraud schemes to embezzle public monies totaling $354,902.
The embezzled monies came from university revenues that consisted primarily of state appropriations and students’ tuition and fee payments, and should have been used to pay for services provided to university students. The Auditor General’s Office submitted its report to the Coconino County Attorney’s Office, which has taken criminal action against Talley resulting in his indictment on six felony counts.
NAU issued 245 checks and made 12 purchasing card payments totaling $354,902 to two fictitious vendors Tally created. “The majority of these checks were fraudulently endorsed and deposited in a credit union account he jointly held with another person, and monies were generally withdrawn or transferred to one of Mr. Talley’s separately held bank and credit union accounts within a few weeks. The purchasing card payments were directly credited to another of Mr. Talley’s bank accounts. All of the embezzled monies were commingled with other monies and spent by Mr. Talley for his personal purposes. To orchestrate and help conceal his schemes, Mr. Talley falsified information in the University’s accounting software, submitted fictitious invoices, and fabricated purchasing card records,” reads the Auditor General’s report.