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A former chief of the Manzanita Tribal Police Department pleaded guilty Monday to stealing more than $ 300,000 from the Kumeyaay Nation’s Manzanita Band as part of a plan to sell police membership to dozens of unqualified individuals.
Anthony Reyes Vazquez, 49, from Camarillo, was head of the department from 2012 to 2018.
Prosecutors say Reyes Vazquez and other tribal police officers recruited wealthy people from the Los Angeles area to become so-called officers.
Although these individuals have little to no law enforcement experience, U.S. prosecutors said they would have paid between $ 5,000 and $ 100,000 to join the department.
These recruits – known as the “VIP group” – were not expected to provide law enforcement services, and many had never visited the Manzanita Band reservation, according to the US Attorney’s Office.
According to its website, the department enforces tribal ordinances and applicable federal laws on the Manzanita reservation in the southern Laguna Mountains near the boulevard.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office said the department is not recognized as a law enforcement agency by the State of California or the Bureau of Indian Affairs and has no authority to enforce state or federal laws.
The VIP group’s donations to Reyes Vazquez totaled around $ 300,000, of which he admitted in his settlement agreement that they should have gone to the tribe instead, the US prosecutor said.
Prosecutors also say Reyes Vazquez paid bar kickbacks and commissions to recruiters, in addition to paying about $ 2,000 a month to reimburse travel expenses from his home to the reservation.
Reyes Vazquez’s plea agreement included an admission that he had been convicted of drug offenses in 1992 and illegally possessed about two dozen firearms while serving as the tribe’s chief police officer.
FBI Special Agent in charge, Suzanne Turner, said, “This brazen scheme not only deprived the Manzanita gang of funding, it also led numerous untrained” officers “to believe they were authorized to carry hidden weapons inside and outside the reservation and laws to enforce with little effort does not rain.
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