| By Big Radio News Staff |
Authorities say a former Rock County Human Services employee faces felony theft charges after stealing nearly $100,000 from a resident at the county’s Rock Haven nursing home.
Rock County Court documents say 39-year-old former Rock County caseworker Annabelle Strzyzykowski is accused of two counts of class H felony theft for taking money from a Rock Haven resident over a four year-span.
Sheriff’s detectives say Strzyzykowski had access to the Rock Haven resident’s bank accounts as a “payee,” and that she racked up about $92,000 in charges — as much as $80,000 of which are considered fraudulent.
Strzyzykowski was apparently working as a Rock County mental health caseworker at the time. The thefts came between November 2020 and May 2024.
Detectives found charges for various things the Rock Haven resident did not buy, including a Netflix account and purchases from Casey’s General Store, Walmart, Amazon and Jimmy John’s, along with multiple cash transfers and charges at two local shoe stores.
Big Radio has reached out to Rock Haven and Rock County’s human services department for comment.
Rock County now tells Big Radio in a written statement that Strzyzykowski is no longer a county employee. The county says in her former capacity as a county employee, Strzyzykowski did not serve as a payee or financial representative for any county client.
It’s not clear how Strzyzykowski was granted access to the Rock Haven resident’s finances, but a criminal complaint makes it clear Strzyzykowski had ongoing contact and a relationship of some kind with both the Rock Haven resident and the resident’s spouse.
County officials have not answered more detailed questions that Big Radio has asked over whether other county caseworkers have access to clients’ finances — and what oversight the county maintains over caseworker-client relationships.
Court documents say “Annabelle was in charge of receiving and paying living expenses for the Rock Haven resident and the spouse,” and had been “appointed as the payee since November 13, 2020.”
Police say the spouse lives in the town of Rock. The Rock Haven resident is 77. The spouse is 76.
The thefts came to light after some of the Rock Haven resident’s bills went unpaid. Court records say the Dane County and Rock County Adult Protective Services reported the thefts as a fraud case and a possible “financial exploitation due to the suspect Annabelle Strzyzykowski being employed by the County of Rock.”
A LinkedIn profile for Strzyzykowski indicates she’d worked for Rock County starting in 2019, and had been employed in various roles through the county’s Human Services division, including as a mental health service facilitator, a caseworker and a crisis intervention worker.
The Rock Haven resident tells police they’d granted Strzyzykowski access to their bank card. They initially said they didn’t want Strzyzykowski to get fired, but later said they thought Strzyzykowski should face penalties.
