{"id":272712,"date":"2026-08-26T18:24:14","date_gmt":"2026-08-26T18:24:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/272712\/"},"modified":"2026-08-26T18:24:14","modified_gmt":"2026-08-26T18:24:14","slug":"lower-merion-school-board-member-charged-in-50k-theft-from-former-employer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/272712\/","title":{"rendered":"Lower Merion school board member charged in $50K theft from former employer"},"content":{"rendered":"

A member of the Lower Merion school board is facing felony theft charges after authorities allege she stole more than $50,000 from her former employer.<\/p>\n

Jennifer Rivera, 41, is charged with four counts of theft by deception, as well as receiving stolen property and access device fraud.<\/p>\n

Police said the investigation began in June after officials at SMB, a law firm marketing agency, reported financial irregularities.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

According to investigators, the company’s CEO and senior finance director said an internal review revealed that Rivera allegedly used a company-issued credit card for personal expenses dating back to September 2024.<\/p>\n

Police allege Rivera charged $1,339 for videography and photography services related to a bar mitzvah, spent more than $25,000 on a vacation for family and friends, and used the company’s Amazon account to purchase $25,596.68 worth of clothing, bathroom accessories and other personal items.<\/p>\n

Investigators also allege Rivera used company American Express rewards points, valued at more than $9,000, to book a future family trip to the Bahamas.<\/p>\n

Rivera surrendered to Lower Merion police on Aug. 24.<\/p>\n

A preliminary hearing is scheduled for Sept. 2.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A member of the Lower Merion school board is facing felony theft charges after authorities allege she stole…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":272713,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[183,185,184,186],"class_list":["post-272712","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-lower-merion","tag-lower-merion","tag-lower-merion-headlines","tag-lower-merion-news","tag-lower-merion-township"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272712","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=272712"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272712\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/272713"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=272712"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=272712"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=272712"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}