Man charged with taking $108K from Sharon business

SHARON, Pa. (WKBN) – A man who used to work at a Sharon steelmaker and now lives in Florida is accused of embezzling hundreds of thousands of dollars from the Mercer County business.

According to a criminal complaint, Cody Rainey worked at SSAB Wear Solutions as a production manager from January 2022 until he resigned in July 2023.

During that time, investigators say he took over $108,000 from the company in the form of scrap metal sales he never recorded, personal Amazon purchases on his company credit card and the sales of other items from the company for which the proceeds ended up in his personal banking account.

SSAB became aware of the theft during an audit in August 2023. Investigators say that Rainey was alerted that an audit was going to be conducted and he resigned a month prior.

The affidavit from the criminal financial investigators with the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Office said that Rainey spent the money on airline tickets, bars and restaurants, ATM withdrawals, at a cycle shop and credit card payments, among other expenditures. The affidavit noted that Rainey traveled almost monthly to places such as Colorado, South Carolina, Florida and Mexico.

Rainey is facing several charges including theft by unlawful taking, receiving stolen property, access device fraud and dealing in the proceeds of illegal activity.

A preliminary hearing is set for June.

SSAB is a specialized steel company headquartered in Stockholm Sweden and is the largest supplier of steel plate in North America. Its U.S. interest is headquartered in Alabama. The company has a small fabrication center in Sharon.

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