DA's office employee charged with theft by a public servant

[editor]

A new case of Theft Public Servant was filed today against Eloise Guerrero Mireles by Special Prosecutor Lee Cox. An additional charge of Theft has been filed against Daniel Domingo Mireles, Eloise Guerrero Mireles' husband.

Eloise Guerrero Mireles had been employed as an Administrative Assistant to the Victim's Rights Division of the Harris County District Attorney's Office. This division handles the receipt and distribution of restitution paid by criminal defendants before their case is disposed by a plea and in her position as Administrative Assistant, Mireles had access to those payments from 2001 until she was removed on August 20, 2009.

On August 19, 2009, the Director of Victim's Rights was contacted by a probation officer who was trying to verify that a restitution payment of $4,000 had been properly paid by a defendant. The Director found that indeed four $1,000 money orders had been received for that particular case but discovered that Mireles had only mailed out three of the money orders to the complainant. The Director contacted Mireles who was out of the office on vacation, and she ultimately admitted to taking the $1,000 money order.

On August 20, 2009, members of the Harris County District Attorney's Office Public Integrity Division began a full audit of the financial records of the Victim's Rights Division restitution program conducting a reconstruction and inventory of the restitution transactions which extended back to November 13, 2002. As a result of that inventory, it was determined that Eloise Guerrero Mireles was responsible for stealing a total of $232,692.79 in cashier's checks and money orders that were payments that should have been issued as restitution to victims of various crimes in Harris County. The audit further showed that Daniel Domingo Mireles, the husband of Eloise Guerrero Mireles, negotiated at least 221 of the 437 stolen cashier's checks and money orders totaling $117,384.69.

This audit began immediately upon the discovery of one of the thefts and it continued to be handled by the Public Integrity Division of the Harris County District Attorney's Office at the request of the Special Prosecutor appointed by Judge Kevin Fine of the 177th District Court where Mireles' first case was filed.

The charge of Theft Public Servant against Eloise Guerrero Mireles is a felony of the first degree and carries a range of punishment of 5-99 years or life in prison and up to a $10,000 fine. The charge of Theft which was filed against Daniel Domingo Mireles is a second degree felony and carries a range of punishment of 2-20 years in prison and up to a $10,000 fine.