East Lyme — The former fire marshal turned himself in to state police Wednesday, nearly three weeks after he resigned from his position with the town following more than a decade of service.

[naviga:img class="img-responsive" alt="Christopher T. Taylor" src="/Assets/news2019/1030ELfiremarshal.jpg"/]

Christopher T. Taylor (Courtesy of Connecticut State Police)

Christopher T. Taylor, 45, of 9 Monticello Drive, East Lyme, was charged Wednesday with second-degree larceny. He was processed and released on a $25,000 bond and is due Nov. 13 in court.

According to a criminal information summary released by police Wednesday, Taylor was allegedly making unauthorized transactions from a bank account under the New London County Fire Marshal's Association, of which Taylor was its treasurer. The criminal report did not specify the time span in which Taylor had been allegedly stealing.

Police were notified about the issue by the association's president. The report said the president had known about the transactions since Oct. 1.

As of 4 p.m., state police had not yet released Taylor's arrest warrant.

Taylor had resigned from his full-time position as the East Lyme fire marshal on Oct. 10. First Selectman Mark Nickerson had said at the time that Taylor had worked for the town for the past 16 years had been out of work on family medical leave since early August "on a very well-documented medical situation."

On Wednesday, Nickerson said, “Taylor resigned for personal reasons, and I would probably guess that this is a personal reason.”

“He did a good job for the town. Whatever he got caught up with, whatever happened, was outside town activity and it isn’t related to the town,” Nickerson said.

Nickerson said he knew that there had been an ongoing investigation but had not asked Taylor to resign.

“He told me he had a situation that he was trying to deal with and that was between him and had nothing to do with town business,” Nickerson said. “He resigned on his own accord and on his own decision.”

In Taylor's resignation letter, he stated unforeseen medical issues behind his decision to leave. He said by text message on Oct. 15 that he was leaving for personal reasons.

He was not immediately available for comment Wednesday.

Nickerson has told The Day that the town's team of "six or seven" deputy fire marshals have "stepped up" since Taylor left on medical leave, all of whom will continue to cover Taylor's shifts until the town hires another full-time fire marshal to replace him.

"That will be determined as quickly as possible," Nickerson had said. "We are going to replace the fire marshal appropriately with a proper search. I think it would be proper for us to do a statewide search while also considering local deputy fire marshals."

Nickerson did not clarify whether deputy fire marshals were employed by the town or volunteer, but said none was "classified as full-time." He said that all shifts are being covered, as a fire marshal is supposed to be on duty 24/7.

m.biekert@theday.com