Theft

EUSTIS, Florida—The former manager of a busy gas station was arrested Thursday after a months-long investigation by Eustis Police Department revealed she stole at least $75,000, according to an arrest affidavit.

Alicia Marie Winters, 28, is facing three charges including grand theft from a person older than 65, organized fraud and extortion. According to the affidavit, Winters, as the store manager of 7-Eleven, 2002 North State Road 19, Eustis, was responsible for payroll, and she made 46 unauthorized direct deposits totaling $69,508 to herself between November 2020 and Aug. 1, 2022, in addition to four fraudulent employee accounts in the store owner’s name that Winters used to deposit more money into her personal account. Winters was also captured on video removing cash deposits from the vault totaling more than $42,000 between Aug. 23 and Aug. 28, 2022. More charges are possible, a detective close to the investigation told Inside Lake.

EPD served a search warrant at Winters’ home in Eustis Thursday and found deposit slips relevant to the investigation, in addition to an HP laptop Winters is accused of stealing from the store. Winters was questioned following the search warrant and said she typically worked 90 hours per week and was “angry” because the store owner had been flirting with her and made unwanted advances toward her, the affidavit states.

Winters told an EPD detective the extra deposits were from an “agreement” she made with the owner. She claimed the owner said he would pay her a “special payroll amount” for time she worked over 40 hours per week, and no one knew about the agreement except her and the owner, who is 69 years old. She said he agreed to $20 per hour for everything over 40 hours, which would amount to around $1,000 over her normal salary of $900 per week. She also stated the owner would pay her lump sums of $3,000 and $5,000 in addition to the regular payroll and “special payroll.” In 2021, Winters said, the owner received a PPP loan and he needed to pay her through payroll with that money to justify the loan.

Winters also admitted paid herself $5,175 after she was fired in August. EPD questioned her about attempts to pay herself $10,000 and $11,000 multiple times after that and she denied those transactions, the affidavit states.

The owner of the store told police Winters stole a metal box from the store that held personal documents, including his birth certificate and business license and she was also questioned about auditing documentation that was missing; she said she threw it away because she believed that was her work that she was not getting paid for. She told the owner to tell everyone to leave her alone and he would get the documents back. “Alicia (Winters) said her intent was to hurt him financially because basically he was hurting her with the investigation,” a detective noted in the affidavit.

Winter was taken into custody and transported to the Lake County Jail, where she was released on $40,000 bond.

In 2017, Winter was arrested on five charges for her role as the driver when a 2-year-old girl was shot in a drive-by shooting at Tavares’ Rosewood Apartments. Winters pleaded no contest to two of the charges and the other three were dropped. She was sentenced to five years’ probation and petitioned the court for early termination in 2021; the early termination was granted, according to Lake County Clerk of Court online records.