THE ATLANTIC SEPTEMBER 2019 49Investigators, it turned out, were won-
dering the same thing. In the spring of
2018, Casey had tried to track him down.
They had scheduled an interview for mid-
March, but Gluck had canceled a few
days before hand. In May, Gluck’s lawyer
emailed detectives to say that Gluck would
not consent to an interview about the miss-
ing money. His stonewalling left police
with only Wilson’s claim that Gluck was
the thief.
But then search warrants unearthed
Gluck’s bank records, showing that he’d
made suspicious cash deposits from 2012
to 2017—more frequent in the school year
and dropping off in the summer, accord-
ing to a report cited in an affidavit. They
totaled nearly $40,000. Investigators
could identify no legitimate source of
income for the money. (Gluck says his wife
had other sources of income.)
In April 2019, police arrested Gluck
for larceny and conspiracy to commit
larceny. The criminal cases are now chug-
ging through the court system in Stam-
ford. All three defendants have pleaded
not guilty. By email, Gluck’s lawyer said
that his client had no involvement in
mis appropriating funds from the school
district and looks forward to clearing his
name in court.
When I visited Gluck’s Vermont home
hoping to speak with him, his wife orderedme off the property, following me across the yard and
yelling, “Fuck off !”THE ALLEGED THEFTS PERPLEXED New
Canaan— the notion that so much money could go
missing with no one noticing. New Canaan is not a
community used to being taken. Yet somehow, the
town presented the opportunity and people seized it.
“It’s curious there were no systems in place,” one
parent told me through the rolled-down window of
her Land Rover as she waited for her daughter out-
side the high school. When I pressed her for her feel-
ings about the alleged thefts, she demurred: “It’s a
topic.” Then her daughter climbed in and she had
to go.
In the cafeterias, Gluck’s buffalo and roasted
duck are gone, replaced by standard fare such as
cheese pizza, mac and cheese, and paninis. At the
middle school, lunch one day in June was a hot dog.
The cafeteria workers remain on edge, fearful
that they, too, might be accused of stealing. School
officials told them not to talk to reporters. Those
who did speak with me, though, said they’re glad
the jig is final ly up. Anyone paying attention knew
something was wrong. For years, they’d talked
among themselves. But they’d been too afraid to
report their suspicions. They had no hard evidence,
only observations.
“Your grandson almost die and you don’t take
a day off ?” Torcasio said. She paused, then added,
“Because maybe she wanted to do her money.”Sarah Schweitzer is a writer based in New Hampshire.Bruce Gluck
transformed the
New Canaan school
cafeterias, but
investigators
later discovered
suspicious
deposits in his
PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY THE VOORHES; NEW CANAAN POLICE DEPARTMENT bank records.