Rigby Man Pleads Guilty to Theft from Fort Hall Casino
| U.S. Attorney’s Office January 12, 2012 |
POCATELLO—John Mejia, 31, of Rigby, Idaho, entered a guilty plea in United States District Court yesterday to charges of theft of funds from the Shoshone-Bannock casino at Fort Hall. Sentencing is set for March 21, 2012, before Chief U.S. District Judge B. Lynn Winmill at the federal courthouse in Pocatello.
Mejia was indicted in July 2011, on one count of theft from the Shoshone-Bannock Fort Hall Casino, where he was employed in 2010 as a gaming technician. At the plea hearing, Mejia admitted that he took money from the casino by creating duplicate vouchers from gaming machines and redeeming the vouchers for money. He is alleged to have stolen in excess of $1,000.
The charge is punishable by up to 20 years in prison, a maximum fine of $1 million, and up to three years of supervised release.
The case was investigated by the Fort Hall Police Department and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.