Ex-Bookkeeper of Comedy Club Given 4-Year Term

The former bookkeeper of the Comedy & Magic Club in Hermosa Beach, who pleaded guilty to one count of felony grand theft, was sentenced to four years in state prison and ordered to repay $176,600 in embezzled funds.

Margaret Michelle Wood, 29, was sentenced on Friday in Torrance Superior Court and would be eligible for parole in two years, said Deputy Dist. Atty. Todd Rubenstein.

Wood, a mother of three, worked for comedy club owner Mike Lacey for several years. Lacey is dyslexic and relied on the bookkeeper to read accounts to him and prepare many of the club’s checks, he said.

Early this year, Lacey decided to have an independent accountant check the books and discovered a shortfall. Prosecutors alleged that Wood took the money between April 1995 and March 1997, spending it to move her family from a trailer costing $625 a month to a home costing $1,200 a month, to buy furniture totaling more than $4,000 and to pay private school tuition in excess of $8,000.