Teacher pleads guilty to stealing 45 school laptops

A former Philadelphia fifth-grade teacher and her ex-husband have pleaded guilty to stealing 45 laptop computers from her elementary school to get cash to help pay for her heroin habit.

Kathleen Kremis, 35, who taught at Ethan Allen Elementary School in the Northeast, and ex-husband Thomas Perry, 38, each pleaded guilty to theft and conspiracy this afternoon before Common Pleas Court Judge Lillian H. Ransom.

Under the plea agreement outlined by Assistant District Attorney Terri Domski, each was sentenced to 6- to 14-months in custody followed by four years of probation.

Kremis will spend her time in an inpatient drug rehab center. Perry, who is facing double hip-joint replacement surgery and uses a walker to get around, will be on house arrest.

"I am so sorry for my students and the school district," said Kremis, amid weeping. "I loved being a teacher."

Perry's attorney, Stephen B. Jarrett, read a letter in which Perry apologized for the theft and blamed the scam on financial pressures caused by his medical problems.

Kremis, a teacher in the city public and parochial schools for nine years and at Allen for two, and Perry were arrested in October at his home in the 3600 block of Miller Street in Port Richmond.

The thefts of the computers - mostly Apple laptops - was discovered after a pawnshop owner called police in August. He told police he had been buying computers from Kremis since the previous November and became worried when he peeled off flower-shaped stickers and found seals underneath saying they were property of the Philadelphia School District.

The couple was paid about $5,000 for the computers, police said.

Domski said all 45 laptops were recovered and 41 were able to be put back to use at the Allen school. Kremis also was ordered to reimburse the district $1,892 for the four damaged computers and repairs to some of the others.