Orange County supervisor Andrew Do, who resigned as part of a plea deal resulting from a bribery scheme that includes payments for the Covid-19 relief fund, was sentenced to five years in federal prison on Monday.
The 62-year-old DO lawyer wanted him to serve shyly in federal prison for three years. Five years was the maximum sentence available under the judiciary agreement. The prosecutors pushed for the greatest sentence.
From 2020 to 2024, “using his position as an overseer in Orange County’s first district, he will lead millions of dollars into personal peers in exchange for hundreds of thousands of dollars of bribery,” prosecutors said in a brief note on their sentence.
“When the county and the country were the most vulnerable (during the Covid-19 pandemic), the defendant saw the opportunity to exploit the chaos for his own interests, and in doing so, he betrayed the trust of hundreds of thousands of his members,” the prosecutor said. “The scheme was extensively planned and the defendant was not worried about engaging others into his criminal enterprise, including his own children.”
The prosecutor argued that “public corruption is a unique form of democratic sabotage,” adding that “it is more corrosive than explicit violence because it infects institutions that operate closely, operate subtly in closed rooms and intends to embody fairness by destabilizing democratic norms.”
Prosecutors claimed he had received severe punishment for his corruption.
The prosecutor wrote that US District Judge James Cerna “should handle the defendant’s crimes not just as theft and fraud by civil servants, but as an attack on the very legitimacy of the government.”
According to the US lawyers’ firm, in exchange for more than $550,000 in bribery, Bes has confirmed that they voted for the Board of Supervisors, which oversaw the Covid Relief Fund of more than $10 million, which began in 2020.
When he pleaded guilty in October, Serna told him he could face a more rigid sentence, which could be appealed. However, if he waives all of his appeals and the sentence does not exceed five years, he cannot rescind the plea.
From 2021 to 2023, he leaked more than $10 million in his county contract with VAS, prosecutors said. The funding is part of a food distribution program during the pandemic, similar to a $1 million grant from the Vietnam War Memorial in Mile Square Park in Fountain Valley, prosecutors said.
Rhiannon works for VAS and is able to use the diversion program as part of his father’s plea agreement. Rhiannon DO was paid $8,000 a month between September 2021 and February 2024, totaling $224, prosecutors said.
In July 2023, Rhiannon could purchase a $1.035 billion home in Tustin, with $381,500 placed in escrow from VAS, prosecutors said. Prosecutors said that in October 2022 the other daughter received $100,000.
Prosecutors said he used $14,849 on two Orange County properties that he owned along with his wife, Orange County Superior Court Judge Cheri Fam, to pay property taxes on two properties of his wife, Orange County Superior Court Judge. Prosecutors said they spent an additional $15,000 to pay off their credit card debt.
“The DO’s bribery scheme with VAS turned out to be a county fraud as it is not only corrupt, but also because it doesn’t provide food to seniors and disabled residents as promised by VAS,” the prosecutor said. I only spent vas
“About 15% ($1.4 million) in meal service,” they added.
Prosecutors denounced VAS and its owners for creating an online video to praise them as “selfless community heroes.”
Meanwhile, later on Monday, the new co-defendant in the case – 61-year-old Santa Ana Tan Huon Nuguen – is expected to first appear in federal court on wire fraud and wire conspiracy charges.
Money laundering fraud and concealment. Nguyen was named in the indictment Wednesday, which was sealed on Friday. Nguyen manipulated hand rescue organizations.
Peter Anne Pham, 65, a Garden Globe friend and associate who ran the VAS, was also charged with each of the conspiracies to commit wire fraud, conspiracy to commit honest services, bribery of wire fraud, and concealment of each of the respective wire fraud and money laundering. However, Fam’s whereabouts are unknown, and federal prosecutors say he is considered a fugitive.
Probation officers recommended it in prison for 48 months, but prosecutors said they should get five years because “selling out his most vulnerable constitutional literally for his own personal benefit during a global medical emergency when he needed him to survive.”
The prosecutor also said, “He was responsible for his choice to involve his family in a crime, expand the conspiracy, and expose him to prosecution. This was not only deceptive, but also strategic.
Doe’s other daughter has lost her job, and Rhiannon “impacts her potential career as an attorney,” the prosecutor said.
Prosecutors also knocked on DO for resolving a Fair Political Practices Committee’s complaint in 2017 to support political donors pursuing government contracts.
Do’s lawyer argued that “there was no actual payment to himself – all important funds were provided to his daughter Rhiannon,” and that he “is his belief that he was deliberately blinded to violations by his desire to see benefits in his adult daughter, and that his daughter was providing valuable services to those who provided benefits to her.”
But “now he recognizes how completely wrong he was in this devastating self-delusion,” his lawyer said.
“He’s seen his career, his reputation, his life and his family in complete destruction,” his lawyer said. “He apologised to his family, his community, his former colleagues and this court. In short, Andrew De’s life was destroyed by his own actions.”
He agreed to step down from his post as a supervisor, suspend his state bar licence, suspend work and volunteer time to benefit the community, his lawyer said.
He also agrees that the compensation should be between $550,000 and $730,500, and that the sale of the house in Tustin is heading for it, his lawyer said.
Do’s lawyers emphasized his service as a public defense counsel and prosecutor and elected official. His lawyers argued that “rewards” for “rewards” for VAS contracts was not a “Quid-Pro-Quo” conspiracy. The corruption was limited to dealing with VAS, his lawyers emphasized.
“This is all important because what we’re dealing with here is the blind spots in which his daughter is involved, not a pattern of corruption,” his lawyer said.
Do’s lawyers also spoke of how his history will grow and eventually escape war-torn Vietnam.
In a letter to Serna, he said he was born in Saigon during the Vietnam War and arrived in the United States at the age of 12 and settled in a refugee camp in Alabama where his parents worked in a cotton factory. He said he and his brothers have done some weird job in the neighborhood and “learned to deal with the racist atmosphere that people, but not all, expressed in the community.”
His family moved to Garden Groves in 1976, where “11 of us shared a two-bedroom apartment,” he writes.
In his letter, “I am guilty. I am embarrassed and fully acknowledge the mistake I made. Take a look at the big picture when evaluating my actions.”
He said, “Looking back, I can’t believe they didn’t see this nonprofit (the money came from the county) evil allowing their daughter to help them buy a home.
“My daughter certainly worked hard for a nonprofit organization. I’m proud of the work she did. But it’s clear I didn’t want to see what they were (bali).
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