US ex-official pleads guilty in heist to steal and sell water with secret pipe
US ex-official pleads guilty in heist to steal and sell water with secret pipe
Dennis Falaschi was charged in multi-million dollar scheme to siphon and resell water from an irrigation canal in California’s powerful farm region
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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/15940107
Dennis Falaschi charged in multi-million dollar scheme as records show he wasn’t only one to take water from California’s farm region
A former California water official has pleaded guilty to conspiring to steal water in a deal with federal prosecutors in the state’s crop-rich central valley.
The Los Angeles Times reports Tuesday that 78-year-old Dennis Falaschi, who used to head the Panoche water district, entered the plea in federal court in Fresno. He also pleaded guilty to filing a false tax return.
Falaschi was accused in a case that alleged that more than $25m in water was stolen over two decades when it was siphoned from a federal irrigation canal through a secret pipe and sold to farmers and other water districts. The Panoche water district supplies irrigation for farmland in Fresno and Merced counties – much of it from the federal Delta-Mendota canal.
Authorities said in court documents that Falaschi wasn’t the only one taking water, but did not specify who else was involved. They estimated Falaschi stole less than $3.5m in water, a small portion of what they initially alleged had been stolen.