BARRE — On March 5, 2025, at approximately 2:00 p.m., Officer Mark Sawyer of the Barre Police Department received a call from an employee of Hamshaw Lumber, located at 99 South Barre Road.
(The account and quotations in this article were sourced from the printed Personnel Narrative of Officer Sawyer and does not reflect any political perspective or personal opinion of News Link Live, which is strictly a business entity.)
Officer Sawyer reported that the Hamshaw Lumber employee, who works in their finance department, said the company failed to remove former employee Alexander Strachan—terminated in October 2024—from its list of authorized account users.
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According to police, Alexander Strachan, 60, is a resident of Shore Drive, Templeton, MA.
The Hamshaw Lumber employee stated that on March 3, 2025, Alexander Strachan entered Athol Savings Bank at 560 Summer Street, completed a withdrawal slip for the company’s checking account, and withdrew $2,000.
“[The Hamshaw employee] explained to me that the transaction was on Athol Savings Bank’s security camera and confirmed the male party at the desk was indeed Alexander,” Officer Sawyer said. “Not only is there an image of Alexander making the withdrawal, [the Hamshaw employee] was able to compare the signatures of the withdrawal slip to the signature that Hamshaw Lumber had on file provided by Alexander and [the Hamshaw employee] claims both signatures are a match. I requested [the Hamshaw employee] contact me when she had the video footage and pictures of the transaction slip.”
Photo credit: Athol Savings Bank, via Barre Police Department
On March 6, 2025, the Hamshaw employee emailed Officer Sawyer the surveillance footage and transaction photos from Athol Savings Bank and a copy of the transaction slip.
“After reviewing the image, it does appear that Alexander is the male party at the bank service desk requesting the transaction,” Officer Sawyer said. “[The Hamshaw employee] advised me that the company would be seeking charges against Alexander.”
Strachan was charged with:
- Larceny over $1,200
A warrant was issued and letter sent to Strachan on March 11, 2025, according to court documents.
Strachan was arraigned in East Brookfield District Court on March 12, 2025. Following his arraignment, he was released on personal recognizance.
His next court date is a pretrial hearing scheduled for April 28, 2025.
Disclaimer: If you are wondering why the incident in this story was from March, that’s because I had to file FOIA request(s) to get the court documents for the incident. FOIAs are time consuming.
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