Indictment Unsealed Charging Former President of Tonkawa Tribe with Embezzling Tribal Funds

OKLAHOMA CITY—A federal indictment was unsealed today charging ANTHONY E. STREET, 47, of Ponca City, Oklahoma, with embezzlement from the Tonkawa Tribe, announced Sanford C. Coats, United States Attorney for the Western District of Oklahoma.

According to the indictment, Street was elected president of the Tonkawa Tribe in April 2005 and served until April 2008. During that same time, Gordon L. Warrior served as the Tribe’s elected vice-president, and Dawena Pappan was elected as the Tribe’s Secretary-Treasurer. Together, the three made up the Tribe’s Business Committee and handled the Tribe’s day-to-day affairs. The indictment alleges that soon after taking office in 2005, Street, Warrior, and Pappan began writing checks to themselves from the Tribe’s General Fund for their personal use. The General Fund account included proceeds from the Tribe’s casino. These alleged checks from the General Fund were in addition to the salaries paid by the Tribe to the Business Committee members.

The indictment charges Street with one count of conspiring with Warrior and Pappan to embezzle money from the Tribe’s General Fund from 2005 through 2008. The indictment alleges that Street, Warrior, and Pappan together embezzled more than $500,000 from the General Fund by issuing themselves more than 300 checks while in office. The indictment also charges Street with 16 additional counts of tribal embezzlement for checks issued to him from the General Fund. For each of the 17 counts in the indictment, Street faces up to five years in federal prison, plus a $250,000 fine and mandatory restitution to the Tribe.

Street appeared today in Oklahoma City federal court and his trial has been set in December 2011.

Warrior and Pappan have previously pled guilty in federal court in separate cases to embezzling hundreds of thousands of dollars in casino proceeds from the Tribe for their personal use. Warrior and Pappan are awaiting sentencing.

These cases are the result of an investigation conducted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and are being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Chris M. Stephens.

Reference is made to the indictment and other public filings for further information. An indictment is only a charge and is not evidence of guilt. A defendant is presumed innnocent and is entitled to a fair trial at which the government must prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.