Cathlamet woman charged with unemployment injury fraud

Wahkiakum County resident Linda Lashell Jordan, 52, was arraigned on Monday in Wahkiakum Superior Court before Judge Donald Richter, for one charge of theft in the first degree.

Jordan has been accused of wrongfully receiving more than $186,000 in compensation and benefits from 2016 to 2019, after a 14 month investigation by the Washington Department of Labor & Industries.

Counsel Joshua Baldwin entered a plea of not guilty for Jordan.

According to court records, Jordan was working as a meter reader for the Pacific County PUD, when she reported being bitten by a dog on her lower right arm in March 2007. She filed an L&I injury claim, which was open for a time. It was reopened in 2014, when her doctor said Jordan passed out any time she saw a dog in a public setting, and could not return to work.

According to a probable cause statement provided by an investigator for the Washington State Department of Labor and Industries, Jordan told the investigator, who was visiting her property posing as a potential customer, that she had been rescuing and fostering boxers for 30 years. He was met by three small French bulldogs and later watched as Jordan was greeted by three boxers. She warned her visitor that one of them might bite, as he had recently been rescued.

She was also found on Facebook using several aliases to advertise dogs for sale or to search for dogs to breed, and despite being advised not to drive because she might see a dog and faint, she was seen behind the wheel nine times between 2018 and 2019.

A pretrial was hearing set for December 7, 2020, at the arraignment on Monday, and a jury trial was scheduled for February.