A former city employee who admitted to lying about her battle with breast cancer was paid more than $10,000 — money she otherwise would not have received — after employees donated personal days to her.

Keele Maynor, 37, began receiving personal days in August 2003 from other employees, who believed she needed the time off to cope with her disease, according to her personnel file, made available by the city. During the next five years, she was paid more than $10,000 for more than 1,550 hours that she did not work.

Ms. Maynor annually was allotted about 31 hours to take for personal leave, which she used each year, city spokesman Richard Beeland said. She could have used more days, but would not have been compensated for them, he said.

More than 20 city employees transferred hours to Ms. Maynor because they believed she needed leaves of absence because of her illness and “in anticipation of future absences due to her illness,” according to an e-mail from Doug Kelley in the city personnel department contained in Ms. Maynor’s personnel file.

Some city employees also donated money to Ms. Maynor in the spirit of generosity, Mr. Beeland said.

Public works employee Gene Hyde donated time to Ms. Maynor in August 2005 and said he regularly gives away days he doesn’t use.

“Keele seemed to be a very genuine, generally nice, very worthy recipient of time and I had no problem doing that,” he said. “(Learning about her incident is) not going to deter me from giving annually to other people.”

In an e-mail to her supervisor obtained by the Chattanooga Times Free Press, Ms. Maynor said she was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2000 and was cleared after radiation in 2001. She said she started fabricating the story in 2003 “and it has snowballed and finally came to a head,” according to the e-mail.

She abruptly quit her position as an administrative assistant with the Department of Land Use Development on Dec. 12, saying in her resignation letter made available by the city that she had been “untruthful” with city employees.

In an earlier e-mail to a personnel employee, Ms. Maynor asked what she needed to do to get time transferred and who to tell that she was “having a rough time,” according to her personnel file.

In September 2005, Ms. Maynor received a letter from a radio production assistant at RBC Ministries after she appeared on the program in August. The letter, which was placed in her personnel file, shared comments from several listeners who heard Ms. Maynor air her testimony.

“I’m truly thankful to God how He has kept the young woman living and blessing her to have such wonderful co-workers who would give their sick days to her,” a listener from Middletown, Conn., wrote.

Chattanooga police said they are in the early stages of investigating Ms. Maynor’s actions.

“(Thursday) officials with the city of Chattanooga and the Chattanooga Police Department began an investigation into the situation involving Ms. Maynor,” said police department spokeswoman Sgt. Jerri Weary. “As of (Friday), officials are still gathering information relative to the allegation of fraud.”

Earlier this year, a Cleveland, Tenn., woman was sentenced to 30 years’ probation after she pleaded guilty in Whitfield County Superior Court to three felony counts of theft by deception and three misdemeanor counts of theft by deception related to accepting gifts and money while faking terminal cancer in 2005, according to the Daily Citizen in Dalton, Ga. The woman, Pam Allen, also had to wear an ankle monitor for 120 days, as well as pay almost $10,000 in fines and restitution, according to reports.

Local charitable organizations also are reviewing their files to see what Ms. Maynor received from them.