Christoffer Denney—once the information technology director for the Legal Aid Society of Orange County—has admitted under pressure from prosecutors that he embezzled nearly $17,000 from the non-profit organization during a three-month period in 2016.
Denney’s decision inside Orange County’s Ronald Reagan Federal Courthouse follows an 18-count grand jury indictment in May 2018.
U.S. District Court Judge Josephine L. Staton accepted the plea change this month—just four days before a scheduled jury trial.
Under the terms of the deal, Denney—who was born in 1984—faces a maximum punishment of one year in prison and a $100,000 fine.
According to prosecutors, the defendant used one of the non-profit group’s credit cards to make at least 18 purchases ranging from $151 to $3,336 for personal use.
The Legal Aid Society receives funds from a variety of sources, including U.S. taxpayers, and aims to provide free civil case advice to seniors and low income individuals.
A sentencing hearing will occur in coming weeks.
CNN-featured investigative reporter R. Scott Moxley has won Journalist of the Year honors at the Los Angeles Press Club; been named Distinguished Journalist of the Year by the LA Society of Professional Journalists; obtained one of the last exclusive prison interviews with Charles Manson disciple Susan Atkins; won inclusion in Jeffrey Toobin’s The Best American Crime Reporting for his coverage of a white supremacist’s senseless murder of a beloved Vietnamese refugee; launched multi-year probes that resulted in the FBI arrests and convictions of the top three ranking members of the Orange County Sheriff’s Department; and gained praise from New York Times Magazine writers for his “herculean job” exposing entrenched Southern California law enforcement corruption.