A 55-year-old Waimea woman pleaded no contest to embezzling almost $100,000 in league funds from the Big Island Pop Warner Football Conference.
Greta K. “Pua” Correa entered her plea on a first-degree theft charge July 7 in Kona Circuit Court. She is scheduled to be sentenced at 8:30 a.m. July 21 before Judge Ronald Ibarra.
Correa, the former league treasurer, stole the money between March 25, 2009, and May 9, 2012, according to the complaint filed April 29. League officials said in November 2013 Correa forged the signature of the former league president, Charles Nahale, on league travel fund checks, accompanied by her own signature.
Keven Lee, former president of the Puna Panthers team, told the Hawaii Tribune-Herald a bounced check for $108 in 2012 from a travel account that should have had more than $100,000 alerted league officials that something was amiss.
The theft jeopardized a December 2013 trip to Florida to the Pop Warner Super Bowl by the then-state champion Panaewa Alii midget football team. News of the theft elicited an outpouring of community support, and a flurry of fundraisers provided the money to send the team and its chaperones to the Sunshine State.
“They overcame and were able to go, but still, it could’ve turned really bad, really fast,” Lee said Wednesday. “Accountability and community trust was compromised. And now we’ve got to ask for more money because we’ve got to send this team to Florida. That became a sticky situation.”
Deputy Prosecutor Rick Damerville said Monday the plea deal calls for probation and also for Correa to reimburse the league $98,100, an amount he said “was agreed upon by both sides.”
“Their (the league’s) bookkeeping is not the best, so when something happens like this, it’s difficult to re-create records,” Damerville said.
Correa has also requested a deferral of her no-contest plea. If the judge grants the deferral, it will erase the conviction from Correa’s record upon satisfactory completion of her probation.
Damerville added Correa is exposed to a 10-year prison term on the Class B felony charge if she violates her probation or fails to reimburse the league. He said if she loses employment through no fault of her own, she can renegotiate the monthly restitution payments. He also said Correa is free to borrow the money to reimburse the youth football league, but only from a reputable lender.
“The league wants its money back, but we don’t want a situation where there are more victims,” he said.
Correa’s attorney, Cody Frenz, said last week she’ll reserve comment until after her client is sentenced.
Correa is a real estate agent, and according to the state Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs website, her license is in good standing.
Sources who talked to the Hawaii Tribune-Herald in 2013 said Correa used at least some of the money to gamble, an allegation the paper didn’t publish at the time since Correa hadn’t been charged with the theft.
The Hendon Mob poker website indicates Correa has entered five mainland poker tournaments, four in Las Vegas and another in Los Angeles, since 2008. Two of those tournaments were in early February 2014, less than four months after the news broke that Correa was being investigated for the Pop Warner theft.
The website also contains an undated photo of Correa playing poker in a casino setting.
Brenda Kuamoo, the league’s secretary-treasurer, said Wednesday Correa’s actions “were devastating to the functioning of our organization” and the theft “compromised the integrity of the league.”
“We have had to take great measures to regain the trust of more than 1,300 families which make up our league in a given season,” she said in a written statement. “… The majority of operating funds is raised through fundraising. Many were afraid to participate or to contribute to these efforts in fear that funds would disappear once again.”
Lee said he hopes the judge orders Correa to apologize to the youngsters victimized by the theft.
“For the six or so years prior, there were basically thousands of kids who had to go door to door selling pretty much everything under the sun … to basically raise this money,” he said. “I did ask the court to consider having her write an apology letter to the kids, not me. Because they truly were the victims.”
Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune-herald.com.