Marblehead woman pleads guilty to embezzling $500G

SALEM – A Marblehead woman has admitted she padded her timecards over a five-year period and also stole other compensations amounting in excess of $500,000 while working as a bookkeeper for a Marblehead plumbing company.Kimberlee Mastronardi, 52, of 195 West Shore Drive, Marblehead, wearing a brown sweater and tan pants, made her plea Friday afternoon in Salem Superior Court to four counts of larceny over $250 as well as a single count of falsifying corporation books before Judge Timothy Q. Feeley.Feeley agreed to continue sentencing Mastronardi until Jan. 31. Until then she will remain free on $5,000 cash bail.The judge firmly warned her that he will not be bound by the penalty he has said he would impose if she does not appear or commits any new crime.Mastronardi is expected to receive a three- to five-year prison term with five years of probation.Mastronardi was hired to handle the books and payroll for Bartlett & Steadman Plumbing Co., located at 67-R Pleasant St. in Marblehead, in 2004.Over the next five years, Assistant District Attorney Michael Patten said she altered her timecards before sending them to the payroll company each week, boosting her salary and her 401-K employer’s matched plan.Her job involved submitting the hours of all employees, including her own, which was shown to her boss, Richard Steadman, but she altered her timecards and the final number of hours she worked before it was sent to the company’s payroll service.Mastronardi earned $23 an hour for a 40-hour week as a bookkeeper, but her 2008 W-2 form showed an apparent annual income of $189,578.She also got $28,000 in unauthorized pay out on her 401-K plan, according to Patten.Over the five-year period authorities say she embezzled $446,179.46 from the company, using that scheme to boost her salary.She also had access to the company’s online banking credit card account at the National Grand Bank where she purchased items for her own personal use, which were not authorized, totaling $85,426.40.Richard Steadman, the owner of the plumbing business who was present during the hearing and is expected to allocute when she is sentenced, became suspicious when he began receiving calls from vendors, saying they had not been paid.He began his own internal investigation by having another bookkeeper review the accounts and learned of the discrepancies.Mastronardi was arrested March 24, 2009. She has since been fired from the company.Patten is expected to argue for a more lengthy punishment based on the case and her past record.Feeley indicated if he changes his mind after hearing from the commonwealth and Richard Steadman, he will allow Mastronardi to withdraw her guilty plea.Mastronardi has a criminal record dating back to 1993. In 1998 she was convicted of larceny, forgery and falsifying books and received a suspended one-year term with probation. She also was charged with multiple counts of credit fraud in 2001, but most of the charges were subsequently dismissed in June of 2003 when she pleaded guilty to other offenses and received a suspended two-year sentence.Last September she was cleared of selling stolen college books by a Peabody District Court jury.