Denver: Former law enforcement officer accused of
absconding with refugee charity funds, by Ann Corcoran, 10/12/18.
The
refugee resettlement contractor has apparently, according to news reports, been
shuttered for a couple of years, but now its former Board Chairman, a former
deputy sheriff, has been indicted for taking money from the publicly-funded
charity.
According
to the Patch:
DENVER, CO — A fired
former division head of the Denver Sheriff’s Office and a former president of
the state Fraternal Order of Police was indicted by a grand jury in Denver
earlier this month for allegedly pocking $50,000 from an Aurora refugee
charity.
Franklin
Gale, 55, of Denver was indicted by a Denver grand jury in connection with the
alleged diversion for his own use of multiple checks paid to Ecumenical Refugee
And Immigration Services, a non-active refugee resettlement agency that closed
under a cloud in 2015 after another embezzlement scandal.
Gale
is charged with money laundering, theft, attempting to influence a public
servant forgery and vehicle theft. The indictment was handed down Oct. 3 and
Gale turned himself in to the Longmont Police, a statement from the Denver
District Attorney’s Office said.
Gale
was serving as a non-compensated board member of ERIS in 2015 when the charity
was closed down following a 2014 criminal investigation by the Aurora Police
Department that resulted in embezzlement and theft charges against two
staffers, Genevieve Marie Cruz and Adam Cole Shryock.
See that Charity Navigator has given
ERIS its High Concern Advisory rating.
According
to the indictment, Gale was a friend of Cruz, who was brought onto the board initially
as a consultant. He ended up the president of the board as the organization
closed down.
ERIS had received public funds to assist with refugee resettlement
through the CARES branch of the Colorado Department of Law Human Services.
Those funds were revoked after Cruz and her colleague were charged.
In
May of 2015, Gale was elected president of the board of directors and the
organization closed its doors.
When Cruz and Shyrock pleaded guilty in 2016, they were ordered by the
court to pay $50,000 in restitution to the agency, the indictment said.
According to the grand jury indictment, about a dozen checks were sent
to the defunct agency in care of Frank Gale at his Denver home address.
The indictment alleges that between November 2015 and April 2017, Gale
wrote $48,668 in checks to himself from the ERIS account and deposited them
into an account he established for his minor son. Gale would then make bank account cash
withdrawals, ATM withdrawals, and/or transfer the funds from his son’s account
to other accounts under his control, thus laundering the money, the indictment
alleges. The actions ultimately added up to the theft of $50,000, the DA’s
office said in a statement.
Gale
is also accused of forging the name and signature of the former board director
on a motor vehicle title for a truck owned by ERIS and then getting a new motor
vehicle title in his own name. More here. Gale
is expected to appear in court on Monday, see here.
I was surprised to find that the website is still up for ERIS here.
And,
I learned from that site that it was a subcontractor working for two of the
nine federal refugee resettlement contractors:
Ecumenical Refugee and
Immigration Services (ERIS) helps to resettle refugees and asylees who are
legally in Colorado (by Church
World Service and Episcopal Migration Ministries), by providing them assistance with educational needs, family and
social services, medical attention, employment, and cultural orientation.
There
needs to be much more scrutiny than there is at the present time of non-profits
benefiting from state and federal tax dollars.
Norb Leahy, Dunwoody
GA Tea Party Leader
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