KAILUA — An employee who allegedly bilked a Kailua congregation out of more than $50,000 by cashing church checks made out to phony charities surrendered to authorities on Monday, police said.

Kimberly Wheeler, 37, who for 14 months served as office manager for Windward Unity Church on Mo'okua Street, is accused of writing checks, some as high as $2,000, from the church's accounts to nonexistent charities and later cashing the checks for personal use.

"You put your time and trust in someone and we really felt totally betrayed by this person who told us she loved the church and loved working there," the church's pastor, the Rev. David McClure, said yesterday. "On the surface she seemed to be a capable employee. But beneath the surface there was a lot of stealth going on. It makes you wonder about human nature."

The fake charities supposedly were to benefit causes from Hurricane Katrina aid to the homeless, police said.

Wheeler, a member of the church's 150-member congregation for three years, couldn't be reached at her home yesterday.

"This is big money for a small group. They were wondering what was happening and they couldn't find it," said Kailua police detective John McCarthy, who has worked the case since the church filed a complaint in March.

Wheeler, who was paid $10 an hour, also is accused of taking out a credit card in McClure's name and using it to take her children to Disney World, police said.

She also allegedly used the church's credit to open a line of credit with a computer company and used it to buy computers for her children, police said.

The case is the second alleged theft involving a local nonprofit group in a little more than a month. In April, police recovered $150,000 in donations meant for the Salvation Army that were allegedly stolen by a convicted felon who was working for the organization. Timothy Peter Janusz, 48, of Kailua, was arrested and charged with first-degree theft.

Deputy city prosecutor Chris Van Marter, who heads the office's white-collar crime unit, said charities, churches, and non-profits are susceptible to "occupational thefts" because they often do not perform criminal history checks and they place one person in charge of the majority of financial matters.

"Most of these organizations trust their managers and most of them are people who do not have criminal records," said Van Marter. "They get the job and then they find weaknesses in the system, and they exploit those weaknesses for their own financial gain."

Church officials say they first became suspicious of Wheeler when they noticed she had written herself a $250 check out of the church's general fund, saying she had been underpaid for work she performed. Church officials told police the general fund is never used for payroll.

During the time Wheeler worked for the church, McClure said officials noticed the church's monthly income was reduced by more than one-third. Church officials were confounded at the loss since the congregation has a history of generous giving.

The drain forced McClure and the church's board of directors to cut the monthly budget by $4,000, reduce staff and slash McClure's salary, he said.

"We were experiencing some real financial challenges and we couldn't figure out why," McClure said.

The financial turnaround since the alleged thefts were revealed has been "dramatic," he said.

Wheeler was booked on suspicion of first-degree theft, two counts of second-degree theft and two counts of second-degree identity theft. She has no criminal record in Hawai'i, police said, and was released pending investigation after she was interviewed by detectives.

First-degree theft is a class B felony punishable by up to 10-years in jail and a $25,000 fine. Theft in the second degree and identity theft in the second degree are class C felonies punishable by up to five years in jail and a $10,000 fine.

In the Salvation Army case, the charity did not perform a background check on Janusz and for the last three years Janusz has worked as the director of planned giving at the Salvation Army's office in Manoa. He was responsible for arranging large gifts such as bequests and annuities.

Had a background check been made, Salvation army officials would have learned that Janusz was sentenced to 63 months in prison for defrauding an elderly Colorado couple out of more than $2 million in 1996, then escaped from prison, was caught in the Caribbean and was sent back to prison.

When he was arrested in April he was on probation for the earlier offenses.

Reach Peter Boylan at pboylan@honoluluadvertiser.com.