Andrews – A Cherokee County woman has pleaded guilty to embezzling more than $120,000 from a local business where she worked for more than two decades.
Judith Florence Postell, 66, of Andrews, was sentenced to 60 months unsupervised probation and ordered to pay $120,507.72 in restitution to Palmer’s Surveying Inc. after pleading guilty to felony embezzlement on May 4.
Edward Palmer, owner of the Murphy-based business, said Postell paid $30,000 in restitution as part of her plea agreement. Court documents show she is supposed to pay the remaining $90,507.72 by the end of her five-year probation period on May 4, 2026. Palmer, however, said he does not expect to ever receive the full amount.
“You can embezzle $120,000 and get a slap on the wrist, but you can go over here and rob a convenience store for $200 and go to jail for 20 years,” Palmer said. “The $120,000, I won’t ever see that.”
Postell was indicted by a grand jury on Feb. 4, 2019, on two counts of felony embezzlement, after an investigation found 448 unauthorized checks written out to herself from the accounts of Palmer’s Surveying.
Suspicions were raised in April 2018, when Edward Palmer and his wife, Katrina Palmer, began taking a closer look at the books and found multiple discrepancies.
The Palmers confronted Postell about the missing money on April 16, 2018. The police report says Postell told them she had fallen on hard times and “didn’t know what else to do.”
Edward Palmer said Postell also managed rental properties for his mother, Martha Palmer, but financial records for those businesses could not be located.
“The $120,000 is the amount we could prove,” Edward Palmer said.
Postell today owns and operates Fir Heaven’s Sake Christmas Tree Farm in Topton, according to the company website.
Palmer’s Surveying is a family owned business that has served Cherokee County since 1974. Edward Palmer said his father, Felix Palmer, hired Postell in 1994 – four years before he took over the family business.