LOS ANGELES — The federal money was supposed to feed seniors and people with disabilities in Southern California who were stuck at home and especially vulnerable to COVID-19.

Instead, Supervisor Andrew Do figured out how to funnel more than $550,000 to himself and his family through a charity in Orange County, California, federal prosecutors said Tuesday. Rather than pay for meals, some of the funds helped to finance a million-dollar home for his daughter and retire $15,000 of his own credit card debt.

Do, 62, resigned Tuesday from the Orange County Board of Supervisors and agreed to plead guilty to taking bribes in exchange for directing more than $10 million in pandemic relief funds to a charity that had no track record of serving the community.

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Do Faces 5 Years in Prison

Do now faces up to five years in prison under a plea agreement that he struck with federal prosecutors. He had sat on the elected board since 2015.

“By putting his own interests over those of his constituents, the defendant sold his high office and betrayed the public’s trust,” Martin Estrada, the U.S. attorney for the Central District of California, said in a statement. “Even worse, the money he misappropriated and accepted as bribe payments was taken from those most in need — older adults and disabled residents.”

The case, the latest in a string of criminal corruption investigations in California, ended the tenure of one of the most influential Vietnamese American politicians in the country. Do, a Republican, represented more than 600,000 people, including a large constituency of older Vietnamese Americans who fled communism as refugees and live on a fixed income.

Starting in 2020, Orange County supervisors were given discretion over how to allocate federal nutrition aid in their districts. Each was allowed to direct $1 million in contracts in the first year, with amounts increasing in subsequent years, according to federal documents.

Do was responsible for directing more than $10 million toward Viet America Society, a nonprofit that was incorporated in 2020, with $9.3 million intended to provide meals for the county’s most vulnerable residents.

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Viet America Society then began to pay a separate company, which prosecutors did not name, at least $3.8 million between April 2021 and February 2024. The unnamed company used some of the money to pay one of Do’s daughters, Rhiannon Do, at least $224,000 over that period.

In July, the same company paid $381,000 to an escrow company, which Rhiannon Do used to buy a $1 million home in Tustin, California. Andrew Do admitted that the escrow money was a disguised bribe, prosecutors said.

As part of the scheme, another of Do’s daughters received more than $100,000, including three $25,000 checks from an air-conditioning company that took funds from Viet America Society.

Some of the money that went to the daughters directly benefited Andrew Do, prosecutors said. In 2022, nearly $15,000 went toward property taxes on two properties that Do owned with his wife, Cheri Pham, a judge in Orange County Superior Court. A similar amount went toward Do’s credit card debt.

In an email, Do’s lawyers, Paul S. Meyer and Eliot Krieger, said that “no statement” was appropriate Tuesday out of “respect for the legal process.”

“However, it is appropriate to convey Andrew Do’s sincere apology and deep sadness to his family, to his constituents in District 1 and to his colleagues,” the lawyers said.

Unclear How Money Was Spent

It is still unclear how most of the money received by Viet America Society was spent.

That question is at the center of a lawsuit that was filed in August against the nonprofit, in which Orange County officials said that they had asked the organization for proof that it had fulfilled the contracts.

Invoices submitted by Viet America Society were too broad to meet federal requirements and showed that some of the contract money was paid to a restaurant with addresses and financial ties to leaders of the nonprofit. The suit accuses Viet America Society officials of using federal aid to buy real estate.

Do had claimed that the charity was serving 2,700 meals per week to Orange County residents.

“That was not true,” Estrada said during a news conference Tuesday. The prosecutor suggested that only 15% of the charity’s money was spent on meals, while “the rest was stolen and used for bribes.”

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Estrada’s office said Tuesday that the investigation remained open; it was unclear whether more people would be charged in the case. Federal documents refer to two unnamed co-conspirators, one of whom incorporated Viet America Society in June 2020 and signed most of the contracts on behalf of the organization.

Peter Pham, who signed the incorporation documents and is a friend of Do, could not be reached Tuesday. Mark Rosen, a lawyer for Peter Pham and Viet America Society, said that the plea agreement and court documents filed on Tuesday “certainly tell one side of the case,” but that they did not reflect what his clients believed to be true.

Rhiannon Do admitted to her participation in a separate deal that she reached with the government, in which she agreed to serve three years of probation, forfeit any interest in the Tustin home and pay restitution.

A lawyer for Rhiannon Do declined to comment Tuesday.

Andrew Do also agreed to forfeit his daughter’s new home and any money obtained through the scheme, prosecutors said. As part of the plea deal and Do’s agreement to resign from the board, Orange County will not pursue state charges against him.

Do is set to appear in court later this month to enter his guilty plea before a federal judge.

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This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

By Orlando Mayorquin
c. 2024 The New York Times Company