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An Indiana University School of Dentistry employee was arrested by university police on Friday after school officials discovered that he had allegedly stolen over $158,000 worth of gold alloy dental products from the school.
The theft started in August 2020, after Michael Frazer placed his first order for $1,158.16 worth of gold in the dentistry school’s product ordering system, and the theft continued over the next four years, according to court records.
The theft went unnoticed by university officials until March 2025, after school officials conducted an audit on the IU School of Dentistry and discovered Frazer had placed 34 “fraudulent” orders for various gold alloy dental products.
These orders came as a surprise to officials in the IU School of Dentistry, as the school had an “oversupply of gold” within its secured inventory and there was no reason for Frazer to need gold in his role with the school.
Officials then investigated the university’s inventory tracking system and discovered that Frazer had not logged any of these purchases in the school’s system, according to court documents.
Each of Frazer’s orders were approved by university fiscal officers, who didn’t suspect anything was amiss, since fiscal officers didn’t know how much gold the School of Dentistry used every month, according to court documents.
According to the school investigations, Frazers placed one order for gold in 2020, five orders in 2021, six orders in 2022, nine orders in 2023, 10 orders in 2024 and three orders in 2025.
The lowest placed order was for $1,120.20 and the largest was for $16,589.37.
After concluding its investigation, university officials learned that Frazer had placed an order for gold products on March 5, with an expected delivery date of March 7.
Day of arrest
On Friday, Frazer arrived at work expected to be greeted with an order of gold worth over $5,500. Instead, he was greeted by Indiana University Police officers who were there to investigate him for the theft of the stolen gold, according to court documents.
At first, Frazer explained that he had placed the order for another Indiana University School of Dentistry employee, and that the employee had placed all of the gold that Frazer ordered inside a safe, according to court records.
Police then asked Frazer to take them to the safe and present all of the gold, but when Frazer opened the safe, there was no gold to be found, according to court documents.
That’s when Frazer asked officers to close his office doors and then confessed to stealing the gold from the school of dentistry. He explained that after he received the gold, he would go sell the gold at a gold-buying store in Avon, according to court documents.
Frazer said he needed the cash in order to pay for “general life expenses” since his roommate was not working, and to help his parents with financial costs, according to court documents.
However, police noted that throughout the interview Frazer had lied several times to police and believed he may have lied about possessing the gold, according to court documents.
Frazer was charged on March 11, 2025, by the Marion County Prosecutor’s office with one charge of fraud-loss greater than $100,000 and one charge of theft for property greater than $50,000.
Contact IndyStar reporter Noe Padilla at npadilla@indystar.com, follow him on X @1NoePadilla or on Bluesky @noepadilla.bsky.social.
