Ex-Putnam employee Sherry Suber pleads not guilty in theft case

SPRINGFIELD, Mass. (WWLP) - A woman accused of using her position at the former Roger L. Putnam Vocational Technical High School to steal more than $14,000 has pleaded not guilty.

Sherry Suber was arraigned in Springfield District Court on Wednesday morning. She is one of two people that have been criminally charged following an audit into the finances of the high school, which has since moved into a new building and renamed the Roger L. Putnam Vocational Academy.

Attorney General Martha Coakley says that as the school’s senior clerk-typist, Suber was responsible for collecting funds from the school’s vocational department heads. She was supposed to take the money and deposit it into the City’s bank account each day. Instead, she is accused of depositing less money than she actually collected; allegedly taking all the money on some days.

The second theft suspect, former Putnam Teacher Ann Berry, is accused of a separate scheme, in which she allegedly used her personal credit card to buy items for the school store, and then deposited the store’s profits into her personal bank account, pocketing a total of $16,000. She is scheduled to be arraigned next week.