By Michelle Hunter
The Times-Picayune | The New Orleans Advocate
NEW ORLEANS — A Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office corrections officer was fired and arrested after officials accused him of falsifying his timesheets to receive $80,000 in pay for hours he didn’t work over a six-month period, according to the authorities.
Curtis Lumar, 42, of New Orleans, was booked May 9 with theft valued at $25,000 or more, according to jail records.
Lumar had been a corrections officer with the department for about nine years while working at the Jefferson Parish Correctional Center in Gretna, said Capt. Jason Rivarde, spokesperson for the sheriff’s office.
Lumar is accused of recording about 2,000 bogus hours — both overtime and regular pay hours — on timesheets between July and December 2023.
Working a large amount of overtime at the jail is not unusual, according to sheriff’s officials. Many employees across the department work overtime shifts at the jail because of the number of unfilled positions, Rivarde said.
In November 2021 , staffing shortages at the facility led Sheriff Joseph Lopinto to require all deputies to serve one overtime shift per month at the jail to relieve staffers. The shifts are now voluntary.
But the excessive amount of overtime reported by Lumar is what caught the attention of sheriff’s office officials and led to the investigation, Rivarde said.
Lumar was booked into the Gretna jail and released later that day on a $50,000 bond.
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