CAPE CORAL, Fla. — Court documents reveal Randi Romanoff, the woman arrested for grand theft and fraud associated with the Lights for Layla Fundraiser gave majority of the funds to Layla Aiken’s mother. The big question is why were funds given directly to Aiken’s mother, and how did she spend the money?
“Layla Aiken’s mother was broke as a joke the day before her accident, and the week after she’s flush with cash."
Those are the words of Glenn Aiken, Layla Aiken’s father. He posted that on Facebook just a month before the one-year anniversary of his daughter’s death.
Court documents show she did get a large amount of money.
Police arrested Randi Romanoff - the creator of Lights for Layla - about a week ago. She is charged with using money from the approximately $70,000 raised in the fundraiser on everything but streetlights for school bus stops, the intended purpose.
Romanoff’s booking report shows she transferred $45,000 from Lights for Layla incorporated to Kathleen Aiken, now Kathleen Redman, Layla’s mom. That means Redman got about 63-percent of the total funds.
Cape Coral police will not say if they’re also investigating Redman in the fraud case. But a local private investigator Walt Zalisko says she has a lot of proving to do if she doesn’t want to end up behind bars with Romanoff.
“If she was given any of that money, and misused it, and it wasn’t used for school safety projects or anything to protect children at intersections,” he said. “That doesn’t say much on her character.”
According to a press release from Cape Police, “None of the Lights for Layla, Inc. donations were used as they were intended and instead were used for personal spending.”
Documents on the Secretary of State’s website also reveal Jade Morton stepped down as the CEO of Lights for Layla in June. CCPD say they’re still investigating this case and can’t reveal if they’re looking into anyone else until someone is charged.
