50 years for stealing fajitas? Yes, Texas judge says, when it's $1.2 million worth
Gilberto Escamilla, a former detention worker in Cameron County, Texas, near the U.S.-Mexico border, just got 50 years in prison for stealing fajitas.
"We feel a strong message should be sent," Cameron County Assistant District Attorney Peter Gilman said in court, according to the Brownsville Herald.
Escamilla pleaded guilty before his sentencing Friday to theft by a public servant, in the amount of $1,251,578.
He got busted in October 2017, when an 800-pound fajita delivery was attempted on a day he took off for a doctor's appointment, the Laredo Morning Times reported. Escamilla usually received those orders, but when this order was turned away, county officials started asking questions.
That delivery was worth less than $30,000, so he was originally charged with a state jail felony level offense, but when the Cameron County DA's office started digging, the investigation found that Escamilla had been selling the meat to individual buyers he had lined up on the side for years.
