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In The Public Interest .com

Saturday May 3, 2008
Bell Gardens, Huntington Park and State Senator Ron Calderon:
D.A. Indicts Mario Beltran, Embezzling Campaign Funds
Editor's note: Mario Beltran is a Bell Gardens councilman. Beltran is also a staffer for State Senator Ron Calderon who
represents Huntington Park, Maywood, Bell, Cudahy and Bell Gardens. Mario Beltran was Huntington Park John
Noguez's campaign manager during Noguez's reelection campaign in 2007.

Press release:
Sandy Gibbons, L.A. County District Attorney's office
May 2, 2008

LOS ANGELES – An indictment alleging that Bell Gardens City Councilman Mario Beltran embezzled campaign funds to pay
his legal defense in a successful criminal prosecution of him last year was unsealed today when the defendant was
arraigned in Los Angeles Superior Court.

Deputy District Attorney Max Huntsman of the Public Integrity Division (PID) said the 13-count criminal indictment was
returned secretly by the Los Angeles County Grand Jury on Monday. It remained under seal until the 31-year-old public official
was arraigned and pleaded not guilty before Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Steven R. Van Sicklen.

Although $125,000 bail was requested in the indictment, the judge set bond at $50,000 and gave Beltran a week to post it.
Huntsman urged bond be set, noting some of the alleged crimes occurred while the councilman was on probation on last
year’s conviction for filing a false police report. A jury in Downey convicted Beltran of the single misdemeanor count in March
of last year. Three months later, he was placed on 36 months probation.

The current indictment comes after a hearing in which political and business leaders – alleged victims – testified before the
grand jury. The eight felony charges include two counts of embezzlement of campaign funds, five counts of theft by false
pretenses and one count of perjury. The five misdemeanor charges are violations of the Political Reform Act, including failure
to deposit cash contributions and failure to report contributions and expenditures.

Huntsman said one embezzlement and the five theft charges involve Beltran alleging telling contributors that he was using
the money he was raising for his re-election. Instead, it was alleged that the money was used pay for his legal defense.

The other embezzlement count and the perjury count allegedly involve using campaign funds to pay for a cell phone under
another person’s name and failing to report it.

If convicted of the felony counts, the defendant faces possible maximum prison sentence of seven years and four months.