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Courthouse News Service reports that Gilberto Escamilla, 53, will plead guilty to charges that he stole $1.2 million worth of fajitas from his job at the Darrel B. Hester Juvenile Detention Center. Escamilla then allegedly sold the commandeered fajitas to vendors and kept the money.
That’s a lot of fajita meat.
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Some may point out that he’s charged with stealing the food over the course of nine years, but that’s still over $130K in fajitas every year. This raises a number of questions:
- How did no one notice for NINE years? The Hester Detention Center only has 48 students. Coming up $130K light on beef fajitas every year can’t be easy to miss. Bringing us to the follow-up question: how much money were they spending on the fajita line item for 48 kids each year such that they wouldn’t obviously miss $130K?
- Why only fajitas? And it’s not just that you’d think they’d feed juvenile detainees other meals. The facility doesn’t even serve the kids fajitas. So now we’re wondering, why not steal a little at a time from line items the school is actually buying? Is the secondary market for fajita meat substantially more lucrative than the market for, say, frozen pizzas? Some frozen pizza is passable. Like whatever brand has that slogan, “It’s not delivery, it’s bootleg juvenile hall pizza.”
- How did he store all of this meat? The scheme unraveled when the delivery vendor called another employee about an 800-lb. fajita delivery. Even if Escamilla had other vendors lined up to buy the meat the same day, there’s some period where 800 lbs. of meat is just sitting somewhere at the facility. Did no one else notice it? Over the course of nine years?
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- What kind of food vendor pays for meat that fell off the truck? There were apparently two different vendors who would buy meat from Escamilla and they reportedly cooperated with authorities. But… how did they get in this business? Is there a setting on Letgo for meat? How are they not immediately suspicious of this deal?
Guilty Plea Expected in $1.2 Million Fajita Theft [Courthouse News Service]
Joe Patrice is an editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news.