After local business owner James Bertrand discovered money missing from an account for a business he has in Lafayette, the Ville Platte bondsman says he has been unable to get law enforcement to look into the matter.
Bertrand, who is the owner of Bertrand Bonding, Bertrand Private Investigator, and Bertrand’s Repo, claims that he and one of his workers recently uncovered that an employee of his embezzled more than $600,000.00 from an account used to pay for suing individuals who have not paid their bonds.
When the business owner realized the theft was occurring, he then took steps to have an audit performed on his Lafayette business.
Bertrand hired a third party to do the audit, who found that there was “theft of money, embezzling of deposits, theft of powers, and fraud and forgery.”
The events that Bertrand believes took place occurred in Lafayette, and therefore he first reported the incident to the Lafayette Police Department. However, according to Bertrand, the LPD told the business owner that the police department in the area where his primary office is located, which is in Ville Platte, would be responsible for investigating the matter.
After being informed of this, he contacted the Ville Platte Police Department who shared that the department where the crimes occurred would be the one charged with investigating the compalint. This was also corroborated by the Louisiana Attorney General’s Office, which Bertrand said means the “police department in Lafayette is who should be looking into what happened.”
According to Bertrand, his employee was embezzling the money by taking bond money an individual would pay and deposit the money into what they called the collections account. The bond payment was then never reported, which in turn made it appear as though people were not paying their bond money to Bertrand’s business, Bertrand Bonding.
Some money was suppose to go into the collections account, because that account was to be used to take an individual to court if they had not been making their bond payments to Bertrand Bonding. The collections account however, is completely empty according to Bertrand.
At this point, Bertrand said he just wants the matter investigated.
“The Attorney General’s Office said that I am suppose to file charges in Lafayette,” said Bertrand. “That’s what I have done. But, if they aren’t going to look into the matter, then the AG said for me to call them back and we will go to State Police. So, that’s exactly what I am going to do if I have to.”
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ELIZABETH WEST Managing Editor