Lehi City News
Former Lehi Streets Superintendent formally charged with embezzling nearly $800,000.
Former Lehi Streets Superintendent, Wade Allred and his cousin, Adam Lake were officially charged with multiple felony charges on Friday. The two men are accused of embezzling nearly $800,000 from Lehi City between 2014 and 2019.
The two are charged with 14 second degree felonies and one third-degree felony, including money laundering, communications fraud, theft and tampering with a witness, according to court documents in Provo’s Fourth District Court.
Allred is accused of creating fake purchase orders for road salt and other road materials from Lake’s company, Vinco Enterprises, but the materials were never received by Lehi City. According to court documents obtained by the Lehi Free Press, “Allred was responsible for ordering these materials for Lehi City. During this time period, Lehi City paid $791,582 to the company owned by defendant Lake as payment on these invoices.”
The City was tipped off to the embezzlement by an employee in the Public Works Department. “The employee stated that there is one company (not Vinco) that has delivered salt for Lehi City for the past 4 or 5 years. When the salt is delivered, Lehi City employees have to stack the salt with a loader to fit the salt in the building. The employee said the amount of salt purported to have been delivered by Vinco along with the salt delivered by the regular company was well over the amount that Lehi City had used and what was left over,” according to charging documents.
Charging documents also stated, “All of the $791,582.00 paid to defendant Lake’s company by Lehi City between May 12, 2014, and July 25, 2019, was deposited into Vinco’s account. Defendant Lake and his wife are the only ones with access to that account. Of the well over $700,000 deposited from Lehi City, $502,000 was withdrawn in cash withdrawals during this period from Vinco’s account. During the relevant period, Defendant Allred made cash deposits to his bank account totaling approximately $140,000.00. Defendant Allred told police that his only income came from his city paychecks and from his wife’s paychecks from her work at a dental clinic. The $140,000.00 was not from either Defendant Allred’s employment with Lehi City or his wife’s employment.”
After Allred was aware of the City’s investigation, he contacted another Lehi City employee and “tried to get the other employee to say that the other employee had been verifying loads. The other employee had never verified any loads.” according to court documents.
The Lehi Free Press will continue reporting additional details when available.
