Philly worker skims $150,000 from city marriage license sales

An investigation is underway after Pennsylvania’s auditor general discovered that money is missing from the Philadelphia Register of Wills’ office. The employee suspected of diverting the cash has been fired, officials said.

A routine audit found that nearly $150,000 in cash was missing from the marriage license bureau, said Auditor General’s Eugene DiPasquale.

“How we found it was receipts were altered or manipulated or they just didn’t exist,”DiPasquale said Tuesday. “The reason we do these audits is the state lost out about $35,000 in revenue.”

Once auditors discovered the cash was missing, they acted swiftly, he said.

“We alerted the office of what we found,” he said. “They took immediate action, and the employee was terminated.”

Register of Wills Ron Donatucci issued a statement saying he’s confident officials have addressed the problem, noting that as of last year it stopped accepting cash for marriage licenses.

A spokesman for the Philadelphia district attorney said that office is reviewing the case to see if criminal charges are warranted.