![]() UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #5: Rita was very polished all the time. I thought - and I think everybody in town thought - that it was all due to these horses, you know? There'd be stories in the paper that she's got another national champion, and she'd have pictures, and. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #4: She was leading a big lifestyle. She owned 400, which would clearly have been impossible on a civil servant salary. ZOMORODI: Rita didn't have just one or two horses. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #3: Congratulate your 2011 World Champion, Good I Will Be, owned and shown by Rita Crundwell of Dixon, Ill. ZOMORODI: What fascinates Kelly was how Rita openly flaunted what she did when she wasn't balancing the city's books. ![]() UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: You know, you have a trusted employee, and it's human nature to trust them. She would always say to me, if ever you make a mistake, don't worry. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: She made it easy to work here. (SOUNDBITE OF DOCUMENTARY, "ALL THE QUEEN'S HORSES") ZOMORODI: In her documentary, called "All The Queen's Horses," Kelly chronicled how Rita managed to embezzle money from the city coffers for 20 years and dupe the entire town, including her colleagues at City Hall. RICHMOND POPE: Rita started working for the city right out of high school, and she rose up through the ranks and became the city comptroller - so the person that manages all the money for the town. ZOMORODI: One of Kelly's favorite cases is about a Dixon, Ill., resident named Rita Crundwell. RICHMOND POPE: It's the intersection between accounting, auditing, fraud, psychology, social psychology and just a dash of just being super-nosy. ZOMORODI: For the last 20 years, Kelly has been specializing in forensic accounting, studying how and why financial crimes happen. RICHMOND POPE: I like to describe myself as - by day, I'm an accounting professor, and by night, I'm a fraud investigator. ZOMORODI: This is professor Kelly Richmond Pope. You know, your kids are outside playing in the front yard by themselves, and you have no concerns. But it's this really small town, super-cute - a place where you don't think people lock their doors at night. RICHMOND POPE: It's this cute town that has this main street where there's a few shops, and, you know, there's a jeweler. ZOMORODI: Dixon is known for its yearly petunia festival. KELLY RICHMOND POPE: It is the quintessential small town, a population of 16,000 people, approximately. About three hours west of Chicago is a town called Dixon. ![]()
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