Brown sentenced for embezzlement

Greg Brown, former Deschutes County Sheriff, will serve 33 months in a minimum security federal prison for embezzling more than $575,000 from the Deschutes County Sheriff's Office and the Sisters-Camp Sherman Rural Fire Protection District.

Brown was sentenced in federal court in Eugene on Tuesday, March 11. His sentence begins 45 days from that date. He will also face three years of post-prison supervision.

Brown paid restitution to both the county and the fire district. The fire district accepted $390,378.16 as restitution. Brown embezzled $171,189.34 from the sheriff's office.

According to the U.S. Attorney, Brown admitted that he embezzled from four separate fire district bank accounts. He deposited funds in Brown's Sabbatical Air account at Oregon Telco Credit Union and into several personal accounts.

Brown covered his tracks by writing checks to entities that would not appear suspicious to the RFPD Board, the U.S. Attorney noted. Sometimes, he falsified the payee.

The funds from Sisters-Camp Sherman RFPD were commingled with funds embezzled from the sheriff's office and used the same way, the U.S. Attorney reported.

The embezzlement was initially uncovered by the Deschutes County Sheriff's Office after Brown left office and the case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Oregon Department of Justice and the Deschutes County District Attorney's Office.