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Massachusetts shoe company Alden Shoe Co. Inc. claims in a lawsuit that former WCVB (Boston) Anchor Bianca de la Garza was given more than $15 million of the company’s money by its former chief financial officer, who allegedly stole the funds over a period of years.

The company claims that Alden’s longtime CFO, Richard Hajjar, stole more than $20 million from Alden over eight years, a theft the company did not discover until late 2019, the lawsuit said.

Hajjar allegedly gave much of the money to de la Garza, who he had met around 2012, when she was still a well-known anchor at WCVB.

The two became close friends and vacationed together often, the suit said.

According to the lawsuit, much of the stolen money went to Lucky Gal Productions LLC, de la Garza’s company that produced her since-canceled, post-WCVB TV show, as well as to BDG Enterprises, which she has used to operate a fashion business.

Some of the money was used to buy de la Garza a co-op apartment in New York City, a Mercedes-Benz, a $158,000 diamond ring, and more luxury goods, according to the lawsuit. It also went towards a personal shopper for de la Garza at Neiman Marcus, who bought designer clothing and other items at a cost of sometimes hundreds of thousands of dollars a month, the suit said.

Hajjar and de la Garza could not immediately be reached for comment.

Note: An earlier version of this story included the wrong photo. It has been fixed and we apologize for the mistake.

H/T MassLive