Today, the Honorable James W. Hollman sentenced Bernadette Cochran, age 44 from Dinuba, to serve 270 days in jail and to pay $500 in fines and $6,490 in restitution for stealing nearly $15,000 entrusted to her safe keeping as treasurer of both the Lincoln Elementary Boosters Club and Dinuba-Malsch Sister City Committee from January of 2004 until April of 2005. On June 28, 2006, Cochran pled no contest to two counts of grand theft by embezzlement.

As the treasurer of Boosters, Cochran was responsible for depositing money and writing checks from the Boosters account. Nearly $8,000 in cash from the spring 2004 Cookie Dough Fundraiser for Lincoln Elementary was never deposited into the account after Cochran counted it in front of witnesses and took it home for safekeeping. Cochran confessed to members of Boosters that she had taken the money home and had no excuse for not depositing the money. In addition, Cochran forged another member’s name to six checks and cashed them between January of 2004 and August of 2004. The total loss to Boosters was $10,704.78.
In an attempt to cover the theft, Cochran then transferred funds from the Dinuba-Malsch Sister City into the Boosters account in April, 2005. The Committee sponsored exchange students between Dinuba and Malsch, Germany. After convincing the previous treasurer to give her signature authority on the account, she wrote five checks without authorization from Sister City to Lincoln Boosters totaling $4,214.55. The total theft from both amounted to $14,919.33. Cochran confessed to the Dinuba-Malsch Sister City members that she wrote the checks.

Det. Chad McMullen of the Dinuba Police Department investigated this case. Jennifer Nichols, Deputy District Attorney prosecuted the case. For questions, please contact Assistant District Attorney Carol Turner at 733-6411.