A former office manager with the Limestone County Health Department in Athens has been arrested and charged with stealing $8,120 from patients and clients over a two-year period, records show.

An audit uncovered the discrepancy, and Prince later admitted stealing the money – fees for anything from death certificates to immunizations – and using it for personal purchases, according to the investigator and an ADPH official.

Paula Pressnell Prince, 51, of 501 Eighth Ave., Athens, was arrested on a warrant Thursday afternoon on a charge of using her official position for unlawful personal gain.

A grand jury will decide whether there is adequate evidence to indict her.

A telephone call to the Prince residence listed at 501 Eighth Ave. indicated the number is disconnected or no longer in service. Her booking information lists her as unemployed and disabled.

Special agent Chris McRae with the Investigations Division of the Alabama Attorney General’s office stated, in his affidavit to support the arrest warrant, that a periodic audit by the Alabama Department of Public Health found that between April 1, 2005, and Jan. 31, 2007, approximately $8,120 in fees from patients/clients were not deposited into an ADPH bank account. He also stated that an accounting weakness at the office “had been exploited to conceal that the fees were missing.”

The audit identified Prince as “the employee responsible for collecting fees, for making proper reports about the fees and for depositing the fees,” according to the affidavit.

Prince declined to discuss the missing fees with auditors and resigned, the document states.

ADPH reported the loss to the Attorney General’s office for review on July 24, 2007.

Prince later confessed to stealing the money, McRae states in the affidavit.

“On May 19, 2008, Prince admitted to me during an audio-recorded interview that she had taken the missing ADPH fees and that she had used the fees to pay for personal purchases and to deposit into her personal credit union account to cover personal checks that she had written.”

Patricia Ivie, ADPH deputy general counsel, said Friday that ADPH’s office of program integrity, which periodically does internal audits in county and state health departments, noticed the discrepancy. She did not know if the accounting weakness that allowed Prince’s theft to go unnoticed had been corrected but said the office of program integrity would have followed up on that.

Prince was released from jail after posting a $10,000 bond, records show.