Aug. 28—A Kentucky woman on probation in Hamilton County for stealing money from a former employer was sentenced on Thursday for doing the same with a Butler County business.
Kimberly Schweitzer, 58, of Alexandria, Kentucky, was sentenced to 18 months in prison for stealing more than $32,000 from Headlines Sports on North Third Street in Hamilton. She pleaded guilty to grand theft, a fourth-degree felony, in June.
Other charges — grand theft by deception, tampering with records and receiving stolen property — were dismissed.
The victim, the owners of Headlines Sports in Hamilton, “did the right thing,” said Assistant Prosecuting Attorney Garrett Baker, by reaching out to the Hamilton Police Department as soon as the theft was realized.
Headlines Sports hired Schweitzer in January 2024, but by May 2024, she had begun manipulating the payroll and accounting software, said Baker, the chief of the Economic Crime Division. This lasted until February 2025.
Schweitzer was indicted by a Butler County grand jury in April.
“She would provide herself with payroll amounts with more than what her salary would be,” Baker said. “She would often times transpose the numbers, so instead of 2,300 it would be 3,200.”
He said she would also run additional payroll amounts during weeks when she wasn’t due a paycheck. The assistant prosecutor said she would then manipulate the accounting software in an attempt “to try and cover her tracks.”
“That’s part of the way she ended up being discovered because at the end of the year, one of the managing partners was doing year-end finances and saw some exorbitant fees in a line item that shouldn’t have been that high,” Baker said.
Schweitzer was indicted in 2021 by a Hamilton County grand jury on a count of theft for stealing thousands of dollars from Lightborne Inc. Between January 2013 and July 2019, she made unauthorized personal purchases using the victim’s corporate credit card and exerted control over property or services beyond the scope of her job, according to Hamilton County court documents.
Headlines Sports tried to do their due diligence, Baker said, looking her up on LinkedIn and evaluating her qualifications.
“Unfortunately, she just breached their trust, took advantage of them,” he said.
Schweitzer pleaded guilty to the Hamilton County theft charge, was ordered to pay $130,000 in restitution with half up front and perform 100 hours of community service. She was sentenced to five years of community control or probation.
The Butler County offense violated the rules of her probation in Hamilton County. As her Butler County case proceeded, her Hamilton County case was continued several times. Schweitzer is scheduled to be back in Hamilton County court this Thursday . She faces six to 18 months in prison, according to court records.
“That’s a lot of money for a small business, and this was a business that was growing,” Baker said. “There was growth in the business … and they were hiring more employees during this time period, so that allowed her to disguise (the theft) along with manipulating the software.”