CLEARFIELD, Pa. (WTAJ) — A Clearfield woman pleaded guilty today in her preliminary hearing after being charged with embezzling more than $120,000 from the doctor’s office she had worked at for more than a decade.

Police report that 46-year-old Natalie Brown had forged checks from a Dr. Yingling who she spent over ten years as a secretary for.

According to the complaint, Lawrence Township Police were called to the doctor’s office on January 22, 2020, with a report from Yingling that Brown was threatening suicide. Yingling tells police that Brown admitted to him that she stole money as her home life was in a downward spiral and she handed him a check for $8,235 that would make up for what she stole.

Brown was taken to the hospital after Yingling expressed great concern for her mental well being and was less worried about the money.

Police later discovered that Brown had received a call from Yingling’s bank on the morning of January 22, about an account overdraft and realized she had been caught, and that’s when she came clean to the doctor while telling him she wanted to take her own life.

During the investigation, the doctor enlisted the help of his accountant to scour through bank records beginning in 2015.

The complaint states that police then attempted to have Brown come to the police station for a formal interview on May 19, 2020. Brown advised police that her attorney told her to not go to the station and not talk to them. She then claimed she retained an attorney from DuBois and police state they never received contact from the attorney as requested.

According to the criminal complaint, Brown wrote various checks to herself, to ‘Cash’ and to various utility and municipal services. The amounts are as follows:

2015 – $85.46
2016 – $728.10
2017 – $7,653.90
2018 – $35,161.52
2019 – $71,417.53
2020 – $8,506.24
TOTAL: $123, 606.75

On Wednesday afternoon, Brown pleaded guilty to Theft by Unlawful Taking.