Information from WYSH Radio
Former Powell Clinch Utility District president and general manager Del Roberts pleaded guilty Wednesday in an Anderson County courtroom to stealing almost $94,000 from the utility.
Roberts pleaded guilty to charging $93,856 on a PCUD credit card and hiding the charges in a special account between January of 2007 and May of 2010. Roberts spent the money on things like vacations, college tuition, dental care, and other personal expenses.
The money has been repaid to the utility district, and onWednesday, Roberts pleaded guilty to theft of more than $60,000 and fraudulent use of a credit card in exchange for a pair of concurrent 10-year sentences. Ten days of that time will be spent behind bars with the remainder of the sentence to be served on supervised probation.
He was also ordered to donate $10,000 during that period to a special fund used to help needy families pay winter heating bills and to perform 40 hours of community service each year.
Utility officials said in a statement that the weaknesses in the district’s internal controls that allowed the thefts to go undiscovered for so long have been corrected and that PCUD has made significant changes to ensure that nothing like this ever happens again.
Information in this story brought to you through an agreement between Oak Ridge Today and WYSH. See more local news headlines on the WYSH website at http://www.wyshradio.com/local_news.html.
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