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Palm Coast Staples Store’s General Manager Is Arrested Over Refund Fraud Scheme

January 14, 2015 | FlaglerLive | 9 Comments

Robert Harper was a familiar presence at the Staples store on Old Kings Road in Palm Coast.
Robert Harper was a familiar presence at the Staples store on Old Kings Road in Palm Coast.

The general manager of the Staples store on Old Kings Road in Palm Coast was arrested Tuesday after confessing to defrauding the store of at least $3,000 by creating fake refunds to himself since last April. Customers were not involved.


Robert Michael Harper, 36, a resident of Bay Spring Place in Palm Coast, faces a third-degree felony charge of organized fraud. He remained at the Flagler County jail this morning as bond had not been set.

Staples Corporate Security officer Ellie Chemaly had been conducting an internal investigation into the thefts since December, according to Harper’s arrest report. The alleged thefts began last April. Tuesday morning, the security officer asked for a Flagler County Sheriff’s deputy to come to the store, where Chemaly had confronted Harper and elicited a written confession from him. The confession was witnessed by a loss prevention officer at the store.

Harper, his arrest report states, admitted to completing fake cash refunds for his personal gain starting in April 2014. That first time, Harper “refunded” a bogus order of blank paper using a fake online order number. He used the refund money to buy a Visa gift card, which he then used at sportsauthority.com to buy sneakers. Ironically, he was wearing the sneakers the day of his arrest.

Harper “admitted to completing the same fraudulent activity of fraudulent returns to cash and cash cards” between April 1 and the end of December 2014, with activity picking up in November. The total loss to Staples is reported as $3,255.50.

On Tuesday, two deputies spoke with Harper in his back office at the store, reading him his Miranda rights first. Harper provided a written statement and said, in a recorded statement: “Over the course of the last eight or nine months I have stolen slash embezzled, whatever the word is the right one, um, about $3,300 from Staples via fraudulent transactions. I would use a fake order number and right (sic.) through the register and pocket the cash or refund the amount to Staples gift card which I would later use to purchase third party gift cards.” Harper said he used those gift cards at stores in Palm Coast, in Daytona Beach or online.

The loss prevention officer at the store told police that he began investigating the fraud in December, and later linked the fraud to Harper, who has his own unique log-in credentials for the Staples system. The investigation found that Harper would conduct the fraudulent transactions once or twice a week.

Staples has about 1,400 stores across the United States, but since facing competition from Target and Amazon, the company’s stock has fallen by more than half in the past four years, and the company announced plans to close 225 underperforming stores this year. It’s not clear whether the Palm Coast Staples is on that list. Adding to the company’s woes was a serious data breach last December, which affected the credit cards of more than 1 million customers at 115 of the company’s stores.

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Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. The Masked Grape says

    January 14, 2015 at 3:37 pm

    I once ate a grape from the fruit stand at Publix. I’m so ashamed !

    Reply
  2. Brian Curbow says

    January 14, 2015 at 4:17 pm

    Obviously not the brightest crayon in the box!

    Reply
  3. Cflguy says

    January 14, 2015 at 6:53 pm

    and they wouldn’t give me a refund for a defective laptop. And that’s why I told him I would never set foot in that store again

    Reply
    • THE VOICE OF REASON says

      January 15, 2015 at 2:36 pm

      He probably took you laptop refund for himself.

      Reply
  4. Anonymous says

    January 14, 2015 at 11:57 pm

    The best laid schemes of mice and men often go awry.

    Reply
  5. PJ says

    January 16, 2015 at 7:45 am

    You get what you pay for.

    Low pay gets bad management.

    Reply
  6. jeremy says

    January 16, 2015 at 4:12 pm

    What a pity! He left a scar on his life for the rest of his life. All for a little money.

    Reply
  7. CM says

    January 16, 2015 at 9:09 pm

    “Ironically he was wearing the sneakers”….?? whats so ironic about that? I am sure he bought them to wear them haha

    Reply
  8. BW says

    January 17, 2015 at 7:00 pm

    The man atleast confessed. Its too bad he demonstrated bad judgement. He could probably now get elected as a county commissioner.

    Reply

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