Addicted To Embezzling?

Reasons People Do It Often Have Little To Do With Money





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"Lisa," whose name was changed to protect her identity, on The Early Show Tuesday.  (CBS/The Early Show)


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(CBS) "Couldn't this just be an excuse for somebody who wants to steal?" Murphy inquired.

"It could be," Shulman replied. "But very often, the people I work with are actually very remorseful, very ashamed of what they do. They know the difference between right and wrong."

"Is it about the money, or the rush?"

"For some people, it may start off as being about the money. It's almost a cry for help for many people, until they get caught and confronted and actually deal with their anger, their feelings of entitlement, the family issues, their lack of appropriate stress-coping skills, whatever it is making them tick."

Lisa says she was forced to face her reality when she was caught at her last job: "I went into this hysterics, sheer hysterics, right there (on the street). And driving home was difficult, because I was just shaking, shaking so uncontrollably, crying hysterically, not knowing where to turn, because nobody knew I was doing this."

When her husband learned the truth, he threw her out, Murphy reports. "Lisa wound up in a shelter, but eventually, her husband took her back.

"We went through counseling, and we're OK," she says, "but he does not want to talk about this at all. This is a very sore topic with us."

Lisa's husband knows she stole from one company, but not the other eight.

"He knows nothing," she says, choking up. "That's why this is so hard. If he ever found out, I'm toast."

Says Shulman, "If you can't tell your family, honestly, that's not ideal. One of my favorite sayings is, 'You're only as sick as your secrets.' But as we work together, and as they get further in recovery. very often they'll hit a point where they will realize they have to come clean."

Lisa confides she's still afraid of so much: holding a job, losing her family, or even worse.

"By doing this interview, you could end up in jail?" Murphy asked.

"Yeah."

"So why risk it all then?"

"It's something that needs to be told. I want everybody to know that I'm not doing this out of greed. I'm doing this because it's a problem. It's a disease. It's a condition."

Lisa isn't working now, Murphy says, but she is in therapy, and in an online support group, and she's on special medication, to help overcome this addiction.

Shulman says these addicts can work again, adding Lisa might need to work for a company that knows about her background and puts in the proper safeguards, to make sure she doesn't steal again.

He even suggests it could be good for a an embezzler to use his or her knowledge for good, as in the movie, "Catch Me If You Can."

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