Student takes $10,000 from grandparent and hands it out at school, Florida principal says

A middle school principal called families after a student was caught passing out a “significant amount of money” to other students at school, according to a voice message from the Florida principal.

The student had taken $10,000 from her grandparent and “passed it out among their peers,” Jason Jacobs, principal of Lake Weir Middle School in Summerfield, told parents in a voicemail sent the evening of Oct. 20. Summerfield is about 70 miles northwest of Orlando.

Jacobs asked parents to help him get the money back.

“If you would speak with your children, and if they have received money from the student, please turn it in to our school resource officers,” he said in the voicemail, which was sent to McClatchy News by Marion County Public Schools spokesman Kevin Christian. “There will be no consequences for turning in the money.”

Deputies with the Marion County Sheriff’s Office responded to the school at around 3:30 p.m. on Oct. 20 and searched the accused student’s backpack, according to a probable cause affidavit. They found $2,587 in her backpack and turned it over to the school resource officer.

A woman later told investigators she believed the teen stole the money from her safe, the affidavit reads.

The teen initially told investigators that she received the cash from another student who had given it to her to “disseminate amongst students at the school,” the affidavit reads.

Later, in an interview, she told investigators that the money belonged to her grandmother and that she had broken into her safe using a screwdriver, according to the affidavit.

Another juvenile told investigators that the accused teen told him the money belonged to her grandmother and that she was allowed to have it, the affidavit says. She had been handing it out to students “all day in increments of $200, $400 and $700,” the juvenile told deputies.

Deputies were able to recover about $3,287 of the stolen cash, according to the affidavit.

Lake Weir Middle School serves students in grades 6-8 and enrolls 1,168, according to U.S. News & World Report.

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