Kohlhaas v. State

From 1999 to May of 2002, the defendant diverted over 100K of her employer's funds to her personal use by depositing payments to company into petty cash bank account over which she had complete control, overpaying company's bills from primary account, depositing refunds into petty cash account and admittedly withdrawing cash from the account and writing checks on it to pay for her personal expenses.

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A Cobb County jury found Kimberlie Kohlhaas guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of six counts of felony theft by taking, OCGA § 16-8-2, and six counts of felony theft by conversion, OCGA § 16-8-4 a. Kohlhaas appeals from the denial of her motion for new trial, contending that the trial court erred in rejecting her claim that she received ineffective assistance of counsel, in admitting certain evidence and excluding other evidence, and in sustaining her convictions when the State’s theory of conviction on the conversion charges “failed to state a claim as a matter of law.” Finding no error, we affirm. Viewed in the light most favorable to the jury’s verdict,1 the record shows the following relevant facts.Nossi Taheri is the president of The Bag Company, a company which manufactures and imports zip-lock bags. In 1999, Taheri hired Kohlhaas, an experienced accountant, as the company’s accounting manager. Unbeknownst to Taheri, Kohlhaas had twice embezzled money from former employers, acts which resulted in two felony theft convictions.2

From 1999 until May 2002, Kohlhaas diverted over $100,000 of The Bag Company’s funds to her personal use. Kohlhaas accomplished this by depositing payments to the company into a petty cash bank account over which she had complete control, instead of depositing the payments into the company’s primary bank account as she was supposed to do. Kohlhaas also overpaid the company’s bills from the primary account and, when the company received a refund check, she deposited the refund into the petty cash account. Kohlhaas admitted that she was the only one who ever wrote checks on the petty cash account. She also admitted that she withdrew cash from the account and wrote checks on it to pay for her personal expenses. In addition, she used a company credit card to purchase personal items, and paid the credit card bill from the petty cash account. The State presented evidence of at least 12 separate acts of theft by taking or theft by conversion committed by Kohlhaas during her employment.

Kohlhaas v. State

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