Rescue squad volunteer charged with embezzlement
After allegedly depositing money meant to purchase emergency rescue equipment in a personal account, Cullowhee resident Addam Carl Holdorf, 21, is free on $20,000 bond.
Holdorf, a member of the all-volunteer Jackson County Rescue Squad, was arrested March 4 following investigation of a paper trail that started in November 2014, according to a search warrant. That’s when the Rescue Squad, with which Holdorf served as treasurer and secretary, put in an order for $6,320 worth of equipment from Winchester, Virginia-based Interstate Rescue, the warrant said.
The company’s owner, Brian Gallamore, contacted Holdorf twice requesting payment, but by Jan. 23, the warrant said, he still hadn’t received it. Gallamore called Jackson County Emergency Management.
“Immediately, I then turned it over to the Jackson County Sheriff’s Department,” said Emergency Management Director Todd Dillard.
Dillard, who coordinates with emergency response units in Jackson County but does not have authority over them, said he’s never seen a problem before in Jackson County with volunteers taking money.
When Shane Burrell, then chief of the rescue squad, dove into the organization’s records, he found that a check for $6,700 had been written to Interstate Rescue on Nov. 18, 2014, the warrant said. Calling the bank that had received the check, Gallamore found it had been electronically deposited into a personal account.
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“My understanding is … there’s not a person watching that check,” Burrell said. “All it’s looking for is the routing number on the bottom of the check.”
The day after learning about the missing money, Burrell said, Holdorf was suspended from the squad.
Employees at the Navy Federal Credit Union asked Gallamore the name of the person he’d been dealing with, and when he gave Holdorf’s name, the warrant says, “the representative told him he needed to contact the police.” The bank’s financial crimes unit later told Det. John Buchanan that Holdorf’s name was the one on the account.
Searches of Holdorf’s apartment and bank records led investigators to arrest Holdorf on one count of felony embezzlement for allegedly taking a total of $6,880.
“There was actually another check that had had slipped through that was for a lot lesser amount,” Burrell said, explaining the higher amount listed on the arrest warrant.
Holdorf had been a volunteer with the rescue squad for several years and was just appointed to the secretary/treasurer position in September, about two months before allegedly writing the check to Interstate Rescue, Burrell said.
“This wasn’t something that occurred over a long span of time,” Burrell said. “This pretty much immediately happened.”
Though some volunteer stations require their treasurers to be bonded, the Jackson County Rescue Squad does not. It does, however, go above and beyond the regulations for volunteering, which simply require that volunteers be clear of felony convictions, Burrell pointed out. Volunteers undergo yearly drivers license checks as well as background checks for felonies and misdemeanors.
Burrell stepped down as chief in February after affairs were straight on the rescue squad’s end, mainly due to the immense workload the situation brought with it — during January, he said, he worked about 40 hours a week at the rescue squad in addition to his full-time job. Charles Blackburn is the new chief.
“I’m a volunteer and it ate up pretty much that entire month,” Burrell said. “That whole month we were auditing and trying to figure things out. I didn’t get to see my family, my son very much during that month. It was a big burden.”
Holdorf’s court date is May 19.
