Florida Keys School District suspends HOB staffer accused in bank heist

A recent Monroe County School District hire reportedly stole almost $20,000 from her former employer in January, left in February, and then successfully applied for a job at Horace O’Bryant School in Key West.

Kunia Rodrigues, 31, was arrested by Miami-Dade County Police on March 15 on a grand theft warrant signed by Monroe County Judge Peary Fowler, according to a Key West Police Department arrest affidavit.

The School District issued a statement Friday afternoon that Rodrigues has been suspended from her paraprofessional position as a teacher’s aide. She was hired Feb. 8 at an annual salary of $19,464. School District spokeswoman Lynsey Saunders said she could not comment any more about Rodrigues’ position with the district.

“The School District is prepared to fully cooperate with the investigation and all authorities involved,” Saunders wrote. “Due to the nature of the investigation, there will be no further comment at this time.”

First State Bank of the Florida Keys officials said Friday that they can’t say when Rodrigues left her job as the lead teller at the 444 Whitehead Street branch. They also declined comment on whether she was fired, or if she quit because the case is under investigation.

Key West Police Department detectives say Rodrigues stole $18,000 from the bank’s vault.

According to Detective Darnell Sealey’s report, Rodrigues was seen on the bank’s security camera taking money from the vault Jan. 19 and transferring the cash to the bank’s automatic teller machines. She wrote down on a ledger that she put $24,000 into the ATM, but it was really about $6,000. Police say she pocketed the rest.

Two employees tasked with verifying that the amount of money taken from the vault matched the funds transferred to the ATM machine said they did not do a check because they trusted Rodrigues.

Sealey wrote in his report that one bank staffer told him, “Everyone trusted her system, therefore, if Rodrigues said she was adding X amount to the ATM, they would usually just write it down.”

This story was originally published March 24, 2017 at 7:12 PM with the headline "Florida Keys School District suspends HOB staffer accused in bank heist."