Puppet Showplace Theater announced yesterday that their \u201cbank account had been fully depleted\u201d after an alleged embezzlement from the 46-year-old Brookline cultural institution.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe treasurer noticed some suspicious transactions after getting a call from their bank about a payment that couldn\u2019t be processed,\u201d Brookline Police Lt. Jen Paster says.<\/p>\n
In an email last night, trustees explained<\/a>, \u201cOn Oct. 7, the Board of Trustees of Puppet Showplace was informed of fiscal irregularities in its bank account. We soon learned that our fiscal controls had been circumvented and that Puppet Showplace\u2019s bank account had been fully depleted. We quickly reported this matter to the Brookline Police Department for investigation, which is ongoing.\u00a0We are working with legal counsel to understand the full impact on the organization and our options for attempting to recover the funds that were stolen from the organization.\u201d<\/p>\n The alleged embezzlement was reported to Brookline police on the morning of Oct. 14. How much money is missing? Paster says detectives are \u201ctrying to get to the bottom of exactly that\u2014how long it\u2019s been going on and how much we\u2019re talking about.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cBased on these developments,\u201d trustees said via email, \u201cthe board terminated the employment of the managing director.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe and our fellow trustees are working with the organization\u2019s artistic director and dedicated staff and resident artists to evaluate what this incident means for our future programming. As we manage this crisis, we will review all of our fiscal operations and expect to institute additional policies and procedures to ensure we are adhering to best practices,\u201d trustees wrote.<\/p>\n The theater has been closed for in-person performances since March for safety during the coronavirus pandemic and has switched to virtual shows. \u201cWe are devastated by this new crisis,\u201d trustees said via email, “but we are hopeful that with the support of our loyal and caring community, our donors and grantors, we will be able to keep the theater moving ahead.”<\/p>\n If this is the kind of coverage of arts, cultures and activisms you appreciate, please support Wonderland by contributing to Wonderland on Patreon<\/a>. And sign up for our free, (hopefully) weekly newsletter<\/a> so that you don’t miss any of our reporting. (All content \u00a9Greg Cook 2020 or the respective creators.)<\/em><\/p>\n Puppet Showplace Theater announced yesterday that their \u201cbank account had been fully depleted\u201d after an alleged embezzlement from the 46-year-old Brookline cultural institution. \u201cThe treasurer noticed some suspicious transactions after getting a call from their bank about a payment that couldn\u2019t be processed,\u201d Brookline Police Lt. Jen Paster says. In an email last night, trustees […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18453,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[109,110],"tags":[220,316,123],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18449"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18449"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18449\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18454,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18449\/revisions\/18454"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18453"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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