The former chief executive officer for the Saratoga/Platte Valley Chamber of Commerce reportedly confessed to police she wrote herself more than $77,000 worth of checks drawn on an organization bank account.
That’s according to Saratoga Police Chief John Moore, who interviewed 43-year-old Amanda Knotwell prior to her being bound over to Carbon County District Court on Wednesday to face one count of felony theft.
In an affidavit of probable cause filed in Knotwell’s case, Moore wrote that she told her successor at the chamber in January about taking the money, and that she was coming clean because she felt guilty.
Knotwell told interim chamber director Stacy Crimmins “that she had taken the money because her vehicle was going to be repossessed and to buy groceries for her children,” the affidavit says.
She also offered to pay the money back by having the chamber issue her a 1099 form as an independent contractor “showing the money as income and that she would work it back,” Moore wrote.
Rather than accept Knotwell’s offer to make good on the allegedly stolen money, Crimmins and the chairperson of the chamber’s board of directors contacted Moore.
Contacted by Cowboy State Daily on Thursday, Knotwell declined to comment on the allegations against her.
“It’s still in the middle of being underway, so I don’t have anything to say at this time,” said Knotwell, who is out of jail on a $10,000 bond.
‘It Was Quite A Bit A Shock’
Saratoga and the surrounding area are a small, tight-knit community where just about everybody knows each other, said Mayor Chuck Davis.
That’s why he said he “was very surprised” when the theft allegations emerged after Knotwell’s Feb. 10 arrest.
Along with representing its member businesses, the chamber also serves as the promotional arm for Saratoga and neighboring areas.
“It was quite a bit of a shock, it really was,” Davis told Cowboy State Daily. “How it all went about, I don’t know. I don’t know how she did everything.
“I think there were quite a few people in town who were kind of surprised.”
The mayor said he still has faith in the chamber of commerce and in Crimmins, who was the longtime chamber director “for 15-20 years” before Knotwell took over in March 2021.
Knotwell left the position at the end of 2025, and Crimmins has been serving as interim director during the chamber’s search for a permanent CEO, he said.
The Checks
The investigation was sparked a little after noon on Jan. 26 when Moore received a message from the chamber board chair, who informed him of the alleged confession Knotwell made to Crimmins, he wrote in his affidavit.
“Mrs. Crimmins stated that defendant (Knotwell) had come in on Thursday, the 22nd of January 2026 and spoke with her,” the affidavit continues. “She stated that defendant had made some suicidal statements and that she had taken approximately $75,000 while employed by the chamber.”
Initially, Moore said he and the board director went over the chamber’s QuickBooks information, but that didn’t reveal anything obvious.
It’s when the organization’s bank statements were scrutinized that it was revealed Knotwell had allegedly been writing checks to herself. Moore also learned that there was another chamber bank account the board of directors didn’t know about.
When Moore did his own examination of the bank records, he reported finding “several unauthorized checks written to defendant herself or her nonprofit,” the affidavit says. “The checks appear to start on March 30, 2022, and continue to Dec. 17, 2025. The checks totaled $77,140.”
Only $25 Off
A few days later, Moore said he called Knotwell and asked if she’d come in and talk with him.
“She stated that she was expecting a call from me,” and could come the next morning, the affidavit says.
That’s when Knotwell admitted taking the money, Moore wrote, even producing a spreadsheet that detailed the money taken over the years to within $25 of what the police chief had identified.
Knotwell told Moore that “since leaving employment as the CEO of the Saratoga/Platte Valley Chamber of Commerce, the money that she had taken had been weighing heavily on her,” according to the affidavit. “This is why she first reported it to Mrs. Crimmins.”
Crimmins had asked her to come up with an amount Knotwell thought she’d taken.
“And this was when she found it was much more than the $38,000 that she (Knotwell) had expected,” Moore wrote. “When I asked her how much she came up with, she pulled out a spreadsheet she had made that showed a total of $77,115, which is only $25 off from my calculation.”
‘I Thought She Was A Decent Person’
Asked how the theft began, Moore wrote that Knotwell explained she at first would transfer money from a bank account into her own.
“Then she found a checkbook for the account and started writing checks to herself and depositing them,” the affidavit says.
She wouldn’t take cash or deposit other chamber money into her personal account. Instead, she would deposit it into the chamber’s bank account and write a check.
Knotwell also appealed to the police chief about resolving the theft outside a courtroom.
“Defendant asked if there was any way to resolve this without going to court by entering into a civil contract with the chamber for reimbursement of the monies,” Moore wrote.
“I advised that it would be between the board and her,” he added.
That’s when Moore said she produced a four-page letter she had written to the board members and asked if he’d give it to them.
When he met with the chairperson of the board and Crimmins later that day, he told them about Knotwell’s letter.
“The board did not wish to read the letter at the time,” Moore wrote.
Mayor Davis said he’d prefer Saratoga had some more positive publicity going into the tourism season, but he’s not concerned that the situation with the chamber will impact it.
“I like good pub, but it happens, and it happens everywhere,” he said. “I don’t know why. I knew Amanda. I thought she was a decent person, I really did.”
If convicted on the single charge of felony theft, Knotwell could face up to 10 years in prison, a fine of up to $10,000, or both.
Greg Johnson can be reached at greg@cowboystatedaily.com.
