Former deputy prison warden indicted for theft, Warren County prosecutor says

Warren Correctional Institution. STAFF FILE

Warren Correctional Institution. STAFF FILE

A former deputy warden at Warren Correctional Institution was paid nearly $19,000 for reported hours he did not work, Warren County Prosecutor David Fornshell announced Monday.

Robert Welch, 57, of Dayton is scheduled to be arraigned Nov. 17 in Warren County Common Pleas Court after a grand jury indicted him for theft in office, tampering with records and grand theft.

Welch is accused of recording more than 350 hours on Ohio Department of Rehabilitation & Corrections time clocks over a 10-month period, beginning in April 2022, when he was not actually working, Fornshell said.

“Instead, Welch spent some of the ‘on the clock’ hours conducting his secondary employment as an adjunct professor,” he said.

Sinclair Community College confirmed that Welch was an instructor from Aug. 30, 2018, to Dec. 11, 2022.

ODRC conducted an administrative investigation and referred the case to the Ohio State Highway Patrol’s Office of Criminal Investigation.

The ODRC has not yet provided information on how long Welch was employed by the prisons, his length of time in the deputy warden role, his base salary nor how the overtime was approved for payment.

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