'She was sharp': Mass. company nearly hires woman serving time for stealing millions of dollars

I'm Boston 25 news reporter Lisa Greschi on scene here in Peabody at Boston Chauffeur, where they say they were well on their way to hiring a woman until they found out she was technically still serving time for stealing a lot of money from previous employers. I was totally shocked, I thought I had like the perfect candidate. Mark Kinney was looking for Boston Chauffeur's next office manager, someone he could trust with all of the company's finances. Her resume was exceptional, she was sharp, she was articulate, she had a great background story. It wasn't until after he sent the offer letter pending she passed a background and references check his team made the alarming discovery this woman had a past of stealing. Not hundreds, not thousands, but altogether millions of dollars from previous employers and was currently still serving her jail time. I was flabbergasted that we were about to offer a position to this woman who could in theory bankrupt our company. This woman was a career felon and had stolen large amounts of money from various companies. $1.2 million from a company in Massachusetts, $700,000 or $800,000 from another employer and then $100,000 from a small painting company in Everett. When Kinney reached out to the district attorney's office he says he was told this is exactly the kind of position the woman shouldn't be applying for. And that she's not even allowed to operate a cash register. And that she was participating in the Middlesex Sheriff's Office pre-release and electric monitoring program, an initiative meant to reintroduce women serving sentences into the community. The Sheriff's Office telling Boston 25 News participants are allowed to live at home or another approved location under GPS supervision and are subject to both routine and random checks. In a statement directly from the program they explain all employment must be approved by the Sheriff's Office before any participant can begin work with any employer. And no new employment was approved during the months of February and March, exactly when she would have started work for Kinney. Scary. Very, very scary. Officials now confirming they will be taking a closer look at the program to lock up loopholes because maintaining the trust of the public, community partners and potential employers is critical to the success of our rehabilitative programs and re-entry initiatives. As for Kinney, he just doesn't want this to happen to another business. I was blown away that the state could be so lenient. I'm all about giving people second chances but you also need to protect the business owner. Now the Sheriff's Office says she remains in custody but couldn't specify whether or not she was returned to a higher level of custody or not because of this. They are still investigating exactly how this happened in the first place. In Peabody, I'm Lisa Greschi for your local station, Boston 25 News.