Fired Inola officer charged with embezzling police property
A former Inola police officer accused of pawning a police thermal scope while still an officer faces one count of felony embezzlement.
District Attorney Matt Ballard's office charged Isaiah Roberts Thursday; the Inola Board of Trustees fired Roberts from his position on the Inola Police Department Monday after police chief Clifford Stevens placed him on suspension May 29.
The Rogers County Sheriff's Office arrested Roberts May 28. He was released on bail later that same night.
Roberts had applied for a job with the sheriff's office, said Sheriff Scott Walton. He said a background check revealed Roberts had taken a thermal scope that belonged to Inola police and got a $300 loan for it at a Broken Arrow pawnshop May 12.
"We find out he's got a history of pawning things, which is not illegal unless you're pawning property that's not yours and saying that it is," Walton said. "... He shows up [to the sheriff's office] thinking that he was going to get a tour and a second interview — whatever, I don't know what he thought — but instead he got arrested."
Stevens said a supervisor checked out to Roberts the same Sig Sauer Echo 3 thermal reflex sight that Walton said was sold to Penrose Pawnshop in Broken Arrow. Inola purchased the sight in August 2023 for $2,398, Stevens said.
According to the probable cause statement for Roberts' arrest, Roberts admitted May 28 he had pawned the scope, and Penrose Pawnshop owner Eric Garman signed a statement confirming Roberts was the person who had sold it to him.
Inola hired Roberts in September 2024. Stevens said Roberts had previously worked for the Wagoner Police Department and Jenks Public Schools before joining the Inola police.
Stevens said he is not able to share much about the situation at this time because the investigation is ongoing.
"It's already hard enough that we're trying to build our trust in our community back up and let them know that this is an isolated incident and has nothing to reflect on the officers that's here," Stevens said.
Roberts is deemed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. He will face a no issue preliminary hearing at 9 a.m. June 30 at the Rogers County Courthouse.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
New York Times
26 minutes ago
- New York Times
BlackRock Is Accused of a Plot Against Coal. The Firm Says That's ‘Absurd.'
Did some of the biggest investors in the world buy up shares in coal companies to force them to produce less coal? An unusual lawsuit in Texas claims that investment firms including BlackRock, Vanguard and State Street did just that, illegally colluding with one another to reduce coal production as part of a conspiracy to fight climate change. In a federal court in Texas on Monday, a lawyer for BlackRock told a judge that the claims 'defy economic reality' and that the lawsuit should be dismissed. 'The complaint ignores that the coal market has been declining for decades for a host of reasons well before this alleged conspiracy,' said Gregg Costa, a lawyer with the firm Gibson Dunn, speaking on behalf of all three defendants. A lawyer for Texas, which filed the suit late last year along with 10 other states, said BlackRock's chief executive, Laurence D. Fink, has written in the past that corporations should set targets for greenhouse-gas reductions. For coal companies, that means 'reducing output,' said the lawyer, Brian Barnes of the firm Cooper & Kirk. Texas, a major oil- and gas-producing state, has taken aggressive action against financial companies over climate issues, including enacting a law that bars state entities from doing business with investment firms that the comptroller says are boycotting energy companies. In January, the Texas attorney general, Ken Paxton, and 10 other state attorneys general sent a letter to financial institutions warning that their policies on climate and environment, as well as diversity, 'could lead to enforcement actions.' As power has changed in Washington, financial firms have walked back their messaging and participation in climate action groups. The complaint in the Texas case noted that BlackRock and State Street had already withdrawn from a trade association known as Climate Action 100+. (Vanguard had not been a member.) The firms have also exited the Net Zero Asset Managers Initiative, which had been a target of criticism from the right. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
CBS News
29 minutes ago
- CBS News
Ex-Orange County Supervisor Andrew Do sentenced to 5 years in prison for bribery
Former Orange County Supervisor Andrew Do, who pleaded guilty last year to taking bribes and directing COVID-19 relief funds to a nonprofit where his daughter worked, was sentenced Monday to five years in federal prison. Do resigned his seat on the board as part of a 2024 plea deal where he pleaded guilty to a felony charge of conspiracy to commit bribery. The 62-year-old received the maximum five-year sentence. Between 2020 and 2024, Do "used his position as the supervisor for Orange County's First District to steer millions of dollars to his personal associates in exchange for hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes," prosecutors said in their sentencing brief. The supervisor took bribes to cast votes that funneled more than $10 million in county contracts to the Viet America Society, where his daughter Rhiannon worked. After going to the nonprofit, monthly payments were made to his daughter, totaling $224,000 by 2024. She used that money to buy a $1 million home in Tustin and Do and his family received more than $700,000 in bribe payments, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office. Do used the money to pay property taxes and to pay credit card debt. "The scheme essentially functioned like Robin Hood in reverse. Mr. Do and his conspirators stole money from the poor to give to themselves," former U.S. Attorney for the Central District of California Martin Estrada said earlier. The prosecution argued that Do should receive harsher punishment for his corruption, as such crimes are "an assault on the very legitimacy of government." "The scheme was far-reaching and premeditated, and the defendant had no qualms about pulling others into his criminal enterprise, including his own children," prosecutors said. Also on Monday, a new co-defendant in the case, 61-year-old Thanh Huong Nguyen of Santa Ana, is expected to make his initial appearance in federal court on charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, wire fraud and concealment of money laundering. Nguyen operated the Hand to Hand Relief Organization. Do's associate Peter Anh Pham, 65, of Garden Grove, who ran VAS, was also indicted on single counts each of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, conspiracy to commit honest services wire fraud bribery and six counts each of wire fraud and concealment of money laundering. Pham's whereabouts are unknown and federal prosecutors say he is considered a fugitive. Do's attorney, Paul Meyer, released an apology statement on his behalf following the announcement of his plea deal last year. "It is appropriate to convey Andrew Do's sincere apology and deep sadness to his family, to his constituents and District 1, and to his colleagues," the statement read. Do's attorneys continued to detail the former supervisor's remorse. "He has watched the complete destruction of his career, reputation, his life and that of his family," his attorneys said. "…In short, Andrew Do's life has been destroyed by his own acts."
Fast Company
30 minutes ago
- Fast Company
How Waymo got caught in the crossfire of Los Angeles ICE protests
Waymo vehicles, the self-driving taxis from Google parent company Alphabet, have emerged as a literal flashpoint in the Los Angeles ICE protests, which ramped up heavily over the weekend. The protests against the president's immigration crackdown in the city began on Friday, as ICE raids broke out among several majority-Latino neighborhoods such as Paramount. Although the subsequent protests were reportedly mostly peaceful, Trump deemed them sufficiently disruptive to warrant sending in 2,000 National Guard troops on Saturday. It was a historic escalation, the first time a president has activated the National Guard without request from a state's governor since 1965 —and it provoked an incendiary reaction. On Sunday, amid rising tensions, protesters ultimately set at least five Waymo vehicles ablaze. Though their reasons for doing so remain unconfirmed, plenty of evidence suggests what might have fueled their actions. Waymo, one of Fast Company's Most Innovative Companies for 2025, first began as a Google self-driving car project in 2009, before launching commercially in Phoenix in 2020. The company then spread out to San Francisco in 2022, before hitting Los Angeles last November. As of last December, the service had driven over 50 million rider-only miles, according to the company's website. Around 100 of Waymo's 1,500 total robotaxis currently operate in Los Angeles during normal conditions, covering roughly 79 square miles from Santa Monica to downtown L.A. After those five cars were destroyed on Sunday, though, the company removed vehicles from downtown L.A. and shut down service in that area for the time being. ('We are in touch with law enforcement,' a representative from the company confirmed to Fast Company.) Before the end of the day, both X and Bluesky ensured that images and videos of the fiery vehicles had circulated widely, leaving a trail of jokes and finger-wagging in their wake. Setting vehicles on fire has a long history in protest going back at least to the 1992 Los Angeles riots following the verdict in the Rodney King trial, and before that, the 1968 Paris Student & Workers' Uprising in Paris. Though obviously illegal, igniting cars tends to serve as a defiant expression of rage and hopelessness in the face of perceived oppression. On a practical level, one reason protesters might be choosing Waymos is because they are owned by a massive tech company, rather than any one individual. (Alphabet led a $5.6 billion funding round for Waymo last fall, to cover costs through the division's next growth period.) Destroying these cars comes with a guarantee that no drivers will be injured, financially or otherwise, since no such drivers exist. Protesters can simply order up a Waymo to incinerate as easily as ordering a pizza. Their very lack of humanity makes them ripe targets in a civil uprising. Of course, there appear to be strategic reasons for targeting Waymos as well. According to a report from 404 Media back in April, the LAPD is known to requisition and publish footage from these autonomous vehicles, which are equipped with roving cameras, to solve various crimes around the city. Since Waymos can function as mobile panoramic Ring cameras, protesters who prefer to limit the amount they are captured on film have incentive to disable as many Waymos as possible. Rumors circulated on Bluesky late on Sunday that some protesters may have set Waymos on fire strictly because the cars may be essentially collecting evidence for future trials, although vandalism of the cars seems extremely traceable. However, one final reason why protesters may have targeted Waymos is because there is an overlap between the people defending their immigrant neighbors and the people who are generally against society's automated future. No civil unrest was necessary, after all, for a fired-up Lunar New Year crowd in San Francisco to set a Waymo on fire in February 2024. All it took was an autonomous cab jamming its way into an intersection packed with revelers who happened to be loaded for bear with fireworks—and an increasing sense that driverless cabs are now a symbol of everything people hate about AI. There have been further incidents of Waymo vandalism, though, in both San Francisco and Los Angeles in the months since.
