A former high-ranking U.S. Environmental Protection Agency official who skipped years of work by faking assignments for the Central Intelligence Agency was sentenced to 32 months in prison for stealing government property.
John Beale, 65, collected paychecks from about 2000 through this year despite absences from work totaling about two and a half years that he explained by falsely claiming he was working for the CIA.
U.S. District Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle sentenced Beale today in Washington. She declined to fine him, saying, “he is paying a hefty amount in every which way.” Beale has paid back $886,186 and agreed to forfeit about $507,000 more.
Beale’s fraud was of historic proportions and his “lies have turned him into a poster child for what is wrong with the federal government,” James Smith, the prosecutor in the case, told the judge before she passed sentence.
The case is U.S. v. Beale, 13-cr-247, U.S. District Court, District of Columbia (Washington).
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