Two Charged With Embezzling From Oologah Emergency Agencies

Two former officers are charged with embezzlement from two Oologah-based emergency response organizations.

According to court documents, Larry "David" Puckett was the chief of Northwest Rogers County Fire Protection District. Randall Williamson was in charge of payroll for Oologah-Talala Emergency Medical Services.

On Tuesday, Rogers County prosecutors charged Puckett with two counts of embezzlement and Williamson with one.

Puckett was fired in March of 2015 after the board overseeing NWRCFPD discovered problems involving a debit card that had been issued to the department in 2008. The board notified the sheriff's office which then asked the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation to take over the case.

According to an affidavit filed by the OSBI, Puckett used the debit card for personal expenses. The affidavit says he also charged the department for textbooks for a firefighting class he was teaching in Pryor, even though records indicated the school had reimbursed him. 

Puckett claimed a large ranch in the area wrote checks totaling $6,000 to the department for conducting controlled burns on its property, when it should have written the checks to him because he claimed to have set up the controlled burns on his own, the affidavit says. The ranch intended the money to be a donation to the department, not payment to Puckett, according to the affidavit.

The affidavit says Puckett made a $2,000 deposit into the account in January of 2015, but the amount of money still missing totals $5112.31

In Williamson's case, the affidavit says Randall Williamson resigned from his position with OTEMS on April 4, 2012, after admitting to not paying payroll taxes and bills. According to an affidavit, a state audit requested by OTEMS found that Williamson had misappropriated $11,821.51 in OTEMS funds by overstating his payroll hours. 

OTEMS management released the following statement about the investigation:

"We take our obligation to the public, both to provide the best possible emergency medical care and to be good stewards of public dollars, very seriously. We appreciate the help of actions such as those taken by the State Auditor, the OSBI, and District Attorney Matt Ballard in meeting and exceeding public expectations and in dealing with the issues involving an individual formerly associated with OTEMS.

Our staff and management are here to protect and serve the public and are grateful whenever our requests for help in doing so are met aggressively, as occurred in this case.

Besides eliminating a serious situation, the process has helped us find improved procedures to use in doing an even better job of meeting our goals in serving the public while safeguarding taxpayer funds."

The district noted that its most recent state audit, released last summer, showed that it had identified and implemented the safeguards needed to prevent a recurrence of the problems which led to the charges filed Tuesday.