Ex-assistant principal charged in money theft
By Staff Reports
Published in News on April 29, 2010 1:46 PM
MOUNT OLIVE -- John Fitzgerald Strickland, 37, resigned Tuesday as assistant principal at Mount Olive Middle School after having been arrested in connection with the theft of book fair money from the school.
Strickland was charged by Mount Olive police Monday with misdemeanor larceny of $421 and placed under a $1,000 secured bond.
Strickland, whose home address is listed as Old Dover Road in Dover, was hired in August 2006 as a math teacher at Dillard Middle School. He was named assistant principal at Mount Olive in 2008.
According to the investigation report, the $421 from the school book fair had been placed in a desk drawer by the secretary who locked the door when she had to leave the office about 4 p.m.
When she returned, sometime between 5:30 and 6 p.m., she noticed that the money was gone.
Nothing else in the room looked out of place and her pocket-book that was under her desk did not appear to have been touched.