Can you imagine putting some criminal mastermind work into stealing fajitas? Well, now former South Texas juvenile justice department employee, Gilberto Escaramilla, has been accused of stealing $1.2 million worth of meat over the course of nine years through the use of county tax money, and no, this is not the plot of the next Will Ferrell movie.
Escaramilla’s illegal fajita kingdom started falling apart on August 7 of the current year, when he decided to take a day off work; leaving his post on the Cameron County Juvenile Justice Department kitchen completely vulnerable to snoopers. According to the Brownsville Herald, an unknown employee answered the kitchen’s phone and on the other line, there was a driver from the Labatt Food Service in Harlingen who was calling in to confirm an 800- pound fajita delivery.
https://twitter.com/abbygibson_98/status/920324571458408449
This would prove to be the beginning of Escaramilla’s doom, he probably shouldn’t have taken that day off, since it took no more than a phone conversation to unravel his whole scheme. The unknown employee who answered the phone was concerned with the call because the Juvenile Department’sm kitchen doesn’t serve fajitas, however, the driver didn’t pick up that there was something off about this business with Escaramilla and told the employee that he had been delivering fajitas to the Department for the last nine years. Maybe Escaramilla should have put the driver in the loop.
According to what the Cameron County District Attorney Luis V. Saenz told the Herald, the unknown employee informed the supervisor about the situation and when Escaramilla showed up the next day he was immediately fired (at least he didn’t get fired on his day off) and was arrested the day after that. The 800-pound fajita order he had placed that day, was enough all by itself to account for a state jail felony theft.
https://twitter.com/TheLeslieMommy/status/920111036337917952
Taking into account the driver’s remarks about having been doing these deliveries for nine years, police had to investigate the claims further and drafted a search warrant for Escaramilla’s house, where they found several fajita packages in his refrigerator, this left the District Attorney’s office no other choice but to arrest Escaramilla again, even though he had already posted bail of his first charge, but the investigation was now pulling to a more serious theft charge.
Saenz told the Herald that Escaramilla took $1,251,578 worth of fajita orders and sold them to his own customers. “He would literally, on the day he ordered them, deliver them to customers he had already lined up,” Saenz said. “We’ve been able to uncover two of his purchasers, and they are cooperating with the investigation.”
I can sleep good at night knowing they caught the fajita thief… thank god https://t.co/cQU48ycSQx
— Yarko (@yarko_snihur) October 16, 2017
This, as funny as it may sound, is a serious offense to the taxpayers and that’s why the investigation is being taken with all the seriousness it deserves. “Up and down the chain of authority, people were signing off on these things,” Saenz told the Herald. “It’s upsetting because the auditor gets a detailed invoice where it states the breakdown of what’s delivered, so they should’ve seen it.”
.@chicksonright When the cops drew their weapons on the fajita thief, they said "drop the chalupa"
Tip your server.
— Kieran Eleison (@KieranEleison) October 17, 2017
Article inspired by Dallas News // South Texas man stole $1.2M in fajitas from county, officials say