Two Lower Merion court clerks pocketed more than $7K in fines from traffic tickets, DA says

Two clerks at a district court in Lower Merion pocketed nearly $7,500 in fines paid by drivers for speeding tickets, parking violations, and other issues, and dismissed the cases to avoid scrutiny, Montgomery County prosecutors said Wednesday.

The crimes, which District Attorney Kevin R. Steele said he would personally prosecute, diverted money meant for state-run funds supporting emergency workers, and spared negligent drivers, including those driving without licenses or insurance, penalties from the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation.

“The significant theft and tampering with official court records by these defendants is egregious and undermines the integrity of the judicial system,” Steele said. “We take these crimes very seriously.”

Lisa Shopa, 58, and Patricia Althouse, 55, have been charged with theft, tampering with public records, and related crimes in connection with the scheme, which investigators said they ran between January and October 2024 while working in the office of District Judge Michael Quinn.

Shopa, the court’s senior clerk and office supervisor, and Althouse, a clerk working under her, directed employees in the office to give Shopa cash payments from traffic citations and issue people handwritten receipts, according to the affidavit of probable cause for their arrests.

To cover their tracks, the women erased the cases from the court’s internal system, marking them dismissed, a decision that only police, prosecutors, or judges are authorized by law to make.

Shopa recruited Althouse, investigators said, so she would not be the only court employee withdrawing cases.

Shopa waived her preliminary hearing in the matter and will be arraigned in county court in March. She was released on $10,000 unsecured bond. Her attorney, Tim Woodward, declined to comment.

Althouse was arraigned Wednesday afternoon and released on $5,000 unsecured bail. Her attorney, Thomas Egan, also declined to comment.

Detectives began investigating the two women in September, when a court administrator reported that there had been multiple claims of theft in the office, the affidavit said.

While serving a warrant there in November, detectives discovered money in Shopa’s desk, with no indication of what it was for or whom it belonged to.

In an interview with detectives, she admitted to the thefts and said she began stealing three years ago, when she was under “financial strain,” the affidavit said.

In some cases, Shopa would steal only portions of the payments, investigators said. A woman paid $450.75 in June to settle multiple citations, and Shopa dismissed three of the cases, taking $332.75 and properly passing along the rest through to the court, the affidavit said.

In other instances, the document said, Shopa would “barter” with drivers who had multiple citations and larger fines, promising to “take care of” their cases if they paid a specific amount.

Althouse initially denied being an accomplice to the theft, but told detectives she often kept “overpayments” mistakenly made by drivers, according to the affidavit. But in a later interview, she said Shopa would leave her handwritten notes telling her how much money she should deposit at the end of the workday, the affidavit said. Althouse said she understood that anything left over was “her portion of the money being stolen.”