COLUMN: REGIONAL DIGEST

Man found dead in Hardwick

HARDWICK - Police are awaiting the results of an autopsy before ruling out foul play in the death of a 70-year-old man whose decomposing body was found at the Windsor Hotel Monday.

An officer went to the hotel, at Routes

Detectives from the Worcester district attorney's office and Hardwick Police Cpl. Kevin M. Landine are investigating.

Cpl. Landine said yesterday that Mr. Wolf may have been dead for as long as two weeks and autopsy results will help police determine how he died. Cpl. Landine said Mr. Wolf had ties to the Shrewsbury area.

Woman indicted in embezzlement

A Hardwick woman was indicted yesterday by a federal grand jury that charged her with embezzling more than $41,000 from the credit union where she worked.

Elizabeth Ann Starkey, 47, of 661 North Road, Hardwick, is charged with one count of credit union embezzlement of at least $41,215.81 from the Norfolk County Employees Federal Credit Union in Dedham between Dec. 13, 2006, and June 5, 2007. She was the office manager and the credit union's only full-time employee at the time, according to the office of U.S. Attorney Michael J. Sullivan.

The indictment alleges that she used a variety of ways to steal money, including writing checks to herself and identifying them on the ledger as credit union expenses; cashing checks that were identified as having been "deleted" from the general ledger; opening an account for the credit union at Sovereign Bank; issuing duplicate paychecks to herself; and transferring money directly from credit union accounts into her personal account.

The maximum penalty if she is convicted is 30 years in prison followed by five years of supervised release and a $1 million fine. The case was investigated by the FBI.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Sarah E. Walters of the U.S. attorney's economic crimes unit is prosecuting. Judge Rya W. Zobel assigned the case to Magistrate Judge Leo T. Soro in federal court in Boston.