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Lowe’s HR manager accused of stealing more than $130K from company

NORTH LONDONDERRY TWP., Lebanon County — A human resources manager of Lowe’s in Palmyra is accused of stealing more than $130,000 from the company. ...
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Lowe’s HR manager accused of stealing more than $130K from company

NORTH LONDONDERRY TWP., Lebanon County — A human resources manager of Lowe’s in Palmyra is accused of stealing more than $130,000 from the company.

Keynan Kinard, 25, allegedly applied for, and later activated, 41 Network Cards for employees who had either quit Lowe’s or were terminated, according to charging documents. Network Cards are offered to employees who do not have bank accounts — paychecks are loaded onto the cards and at the point, they’re used as normal debit cards for purchases or ATM withdraws.

When contacted by the Lowe’s corporate office about the increased number of Network Cards, Kinard blamed a “new manager,” claiming that the new manager made a mistake. Kinard then told corporate that he would correct the problem.

In addition to the uptick of Network Cards, a Loss Prevention Officer noticed that the 41 employees had pay increases after they left Lowe’s. The officer also discovered that some employees had overtime assigned for their pay period while others had vacation time and bereavement leave, charging documents say.

W-4’s were also changed for each employee. The residence of each employee was changed to the store address and the amount of dependents, in most cases, was increased to eight. Charging documents state that this was done so the employees would not receive mail on the changes and so the paychecks would reflect the maximum amount of gross payout.

Lowe’s attempted to reach out to all of the employees affected by the scam. The company made contact with three of them — the individuals denied making changes to their W-4’s and signing up for Network Cards. They also reported that during employment, their paychecks were direct deposited.

After hearing the conflicting stories, the Loss Prevention Officer interviewed Kinard. According to charging documents, Kinard admitted to the theft of funds, changing the addresses and dependents on the W-4’s and completing the paperwork for the employees to activate their Network Cards. Kinard also told the officer that he changed the pay rate for each employee, clocked them in and out to show unworked hours and used the Network Cards at various ATM’s to obtain cash.

It was also determined that Kinard was using the funds for personal gain — he originally told the officer that the money was used to pay back restitution for an insurance fraud arrest.

The money Kinard stole was placed in two banks, Members 1st and BB&T, as well as through ATM transactions.

The Harrisburg resident faces charges of dealing in proceeds of unlawful activity, theft by unlawful taking, identity theft, unlawful use of a computer, access device fraud and tampering with record, court documents show.

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