Today, the board of Portland theater company Defunkt has posted the following on the theater company's website. It's signed by the board's six members. Bolds are mine:

Dear Friend of Defunkt Theatre,

We are writing you today with some serious news. We have been informed that our former Executive Director, Lori Sue Hoffman has been arrested on several criminal charges in connection with her role at Defunkt. In May of 2015, members of our Board of Directors became aware of a multi year pattern of theft, misappropriation of funds and other criminal activity on the part of Ms. Hoffman. She was immediately released from her volunteer position as our Executive Director and the matter was turned over to the proper authorities. We are informing you of this because it involves a significant amount of money, and we believe that our loyal supporters deserve to hear directly from us. The main thing we want you to know is that this has been a major learning experience for us, and we have taken immediate, concrete actions to make sure nothing like this can ever happen at Defunkt again.

Mismanagement and financial strife within arts organizations in general are common enough as to be hardly newsworthy, but they don't normally take the form of alleged theft, so I called up Defunkt and spoke with co-artistic director Andrew Klaus-Vineyard, who said that the company first became aware of Hoffman's alleged, ongoing theft approximately a year ago. Hoffman had been spending Defunkt's funds for her personal use, Klaus-Vineyard said, including writing checks to herself, her boyfriend, and her son, "all the while telling us we had almost no funds."

Klaus-Vineyard said that the company had held back on making any public statements about the theft while the investigation was ongoing, but that they posted their announcement as soon as they found out Hoffman had been arrested and booked last night, following an indictment from a grand jury on Tuesday. Court documents back up this timeline, and show that the grand jury indicted Hoffman on 10 counts related to theft.

Now that Hoffman has been arrested, Klaus-Vineyard says that the company chose to go public with information about the theft and arrest as a measure of transparency and to warn other potential victims. "We're very concerned that this could be happening to other people," he said.

Defunkt is like many scrappy Portland theater companies. It's not fancy. It produces innovative plays in a space adjacent to a coffee shop. "We're a small nonprofit," said Klaus-Vineyard. "We seat 40. So to steal from us is pretty low."

Hoffman was released yesterday after being booked. Today, she attended her arraignment. She has pled not guilty on all counts. A second hearing is scheduled for June 2.