A county supervisor in Orange County, California, has agreed to plead guilty to a federal felony bribery charge after collecting $550,000 to steer $9 million in pandemic relief funds to a charity that was supposed to provide meals to the elderly.
Andrew Hoang Do, 62, resigned Tuesday as he admitted to funneling the money to the Viet American Society, which then paid kickbacks to his daughters.
Combined with other bribes and misspending, the society only ended up spending 15% of taxpayer pandemic funds on meals.
Do admitted he knew the society was wasting the money but he continued to vote as a county supervisor to support the contracts, and even helped film a video praising the society’s work.
“By putting his own interests over those of his constituents, the defendant sold his high office and betrayed the public’s trust,” said Martin Estrada, the U.S. attorney for Central California. “Even worse, the money he misappropriated and accepted as bribe payments was taken from those most in need – older adults and disabled residents. Our community deserved much better.”
The case is the latest in a string of inside jobs where government employees used their positions to steer pandemic funds to themselves or their associates.
Prosecutors agreed not to take Rhiannon Do, one of the daughters, to trial as long as she agreed to three years of supervised probation.
All told, the father admitted to helping steer at least seven contracts to the VAS from 2020 through this year. The contracts totaled $10.8 million.
The bulk of the contracts were to provide meals.
Two of them, for mental health services, were signed by Do’s daughter on behalf of VAS.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
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