Washington State Tribal Employee Pleads Guilty To Embezzling $115K From Child Welfare Department

From the Seattle Post-Intelligencer on 2/14/14:

A Suquamish tribal employee pleaded guilty in federal court in Tacoma on Friday to embezzlement from an tribal organization after siphoning more than $115,000 in checks and food vouchers from the tribe's child welfare department.

Renee Pearl Peleti was the employee responsible for distributing checks to Indian Child Welfare Department (ICW) clients and had the ability to request checks from the tribe's financial office and manipulate the amounts, according to the court complaint.

The ICW assists tribal families and children with food, clothing and school supplies.

Detectives believe Peleti wrote herself about 261 checks totaling $88,747 and paid $2,893 in fraudulent checks to her personal Puget Sound Energy account, court records indicate.

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