Former Corps worker headed to prison

Published 12:00 am Wednesday, December 17, 2008

A former U.S. Army Corps of Engineers employee faces jail time on embezzlement of federal funds.

Donald Smith, 46, was sentenced Tuesday by U.S. District Judge David Bramlette to 12 months and 1 day in prison, plus three years of supervised release for embezzling more than $71,000 during his employment at the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center in Vicksburg, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Jackson said.

The sentence is lower than the maximum penalty under federal laws governing the embezzlement, theft and converting to personal use money or other federal property with a value exceeding $1,000, which is 10 years in jail and a $250,000 fine.

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Smith also was ordered to pay back the $71,194.97 as he agreed when he pleaded guilty to the single count in October. An indictment returned in July by a federal grand jury stated Smith used various government credit cards from January 2004 through March 2005 to purchase more than $56,400.46 in items for his personal use and submitted various fraudulent travel claims from December 2004 through July 2006 equaling $14,794.51. A second count in the indictment was dismissed.

Smith directed the Engineer Research and Development Center Graduate Institute from March 2005 to July 2006.

At the time of his resignation from ERDC in May 2007, Smith, a research civil engineer, had more than 23 years of government experience as a civil employee.

The case was investigated by the Special Agent of the U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Command, Vicksburg Fraud Resident Agency and prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Mike Hurst.

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Contact Danny Barrett Jr. at dbarrett@vicksburgpost.com