Warren County Circuit Clerk Shelly Ashley-Palmertree transferred about $138,000 Thursday into an escrow account where it will be divvied up among the state, county and others, county administrator John Smith said.

Smith said he received two checks from Ashley-Palmertree — one for $127,856.46 in criminal fees and another for $10,138.28 in civil fees — at about 11:30 a.m. Thursday in the Chancery Clerk’s Office.

“This money is going to come out of the control of Shelly and be under the control of Warren County,” Smith said.

The funds will remain in an escrow account until they are audited by independent accountant David Richardson who will decide who gets final payment from the money. The county is guaranteed a share of the $127,856.46, though how much is to be determined, Smith said.

In September, State Auditor Stacey Pickering’s officer ordered Ashley-Palmertree to repay $199,588 representing amounts she and her father, Larry Ashley, whom she succeeded in office in 2004, withdrew from criminal and civil court statutory fee accounts in excess of what state law allows, Pickering’s spokeswoman, Lisa Shoemaker, said in September.

Last week, Shoemaker said the amount is closer to $138,000, because part of the nearly $200,000 in question belonged to Larry Ashley’s administration rather than his daughter’s.

“We can’t really hold her responsible for a previous administration,” Shoemaker said.

“I still don’t know what the breakdown is, but the majority of it will go to the state,” Smith said Thursday of the $138,000.

Money from the civil claims will be returned to those who won the judgments in court.

“When the audit is completed, we will be given a list of who we need to pay on the civil side,” Smith said. “I don’t think any of that money is going to stay with the county.”

Smith said he was not privy to information on the audit or how long it would take.

Repeated attempts Thursday and this morning to reach Ashley-Palmertree at her office and on her cell phone were unsuccessful, and she did not return repeated messages. A spokesman in her office said this morning that she was in court.

A Vicksburg Post reporter sat outside the main entrance to Ashley-Palmertree’s office on Thursday from about 9:45 a.m. until 12:20 p.m. but did not see her leave the office. There are two exits from the circuit clerk’s office.

During that time — from about 10 a.m. until shortly after noon — deputy circuit clerks said Ashley-Palmertree was on a conference call with the Secretary of State’s Office, but a representative for Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann denies the communication.

“We had no conference calls with any circuit clerk in the state today,” said Pamela Weaver, a spokeswoman for Hosemann.

In addition to the money transferred Thursday, at least $340,000 remains in dispute in the state auditor’s review of fee accounting practices in the circuit clerk’s office. The records being reviewed date to at least 2006, according to annual county audit reports on the auditor’s website.

Pickering’s office said in February 2011 that fee practices in the office were under investigation. Ashley-Palmertree, however, has said the term is inaccurate and the effort has been a cooperative one between her office and the state auditor’s.

With some exceptions, state law caps a circuit clerk’s annual salary at $90,000. County audits have repeatedly cited Ashley-Palmertree, 41, for collecting fees in excess of the limit.

Ashley-Palmertree was elected to a third four-year term in November with 49.7 percent of the popular vote in a four-way race.