$500,000 Souvenir Scam : Disneyland Worker Charged With Theft

A half-million-dollar embezzlement scam at Disneyland that had gone undetected for almost a year began unraveling with a telephone call from a suspicious shopper at a garage sale 65 miles from the amusement park, authorities said Tuesday.

The shopper wondered why he had to write a check to a man in Anaheim for the cut-rate Mickey Mouse watches and Magic Kingdom shirts he was buying in Thousand Oaks. So he called a friend at Disneyland security.

That call last week led police and Disney investigators to a 20-year Disney employee who they suspect took more than $500,000 in stuffed animals, clothing and other souvenirs over the last year from the amusement park’s main warehouse.

Bail Set at $300,000

On Tuesday, Philip Neil Schmitz, 38, unshaven and wearing a blue polo shirt, pleaded not guilty in Orange County Municipal Court to one count of grand theft. Schmitz, arrested last Thursday when Anaheim police were called into the case by Disneyland officials, is being held in Orange County Jail in lieu of $300,000 bail, authorities said.

Judge Robert B. Hutson denied a request by Schmitz’s attorney, Robert A. Van Hoy, to lower bail for the warehouse supervisor. Deputy Dist. Atty. Peter W. Huelsenbeck argued against the lower bail and told the judge that Disney investigators had learned that Schmitz’s family had just emptied one savings account of $40,000, probably “proceeds from the embezzled property.”

Schmitz’s wife, sister and mother, whom he waved at in the audience from his courtroom holding cell, declined to talk with reporters after the hearing. Van Hoy, retained by the family on Monday, described Schmitz, who has a young son and daughter, as a “longtime and valuable Disney employee, highly thought of” who never had been arrested before.

“I don’t think (anyone) has a firm enough grasp on the case to know who might ultimately be responsible,” he said after the hearing.

Disneyland spokesman Bob Roth said that the theft was the largest in the park’s history and that company officials are still mystified how the scam went undetected for so long. “I can’t say for positive how it was done,” he said. “It’s possible through filling out forms to make it seem the merchandise was delivered or charged to other areas.”

Prosecutor Outlines Case

Roth said Schmitz, who was placed on “investigatory suspension” after his arrest, had been a supervisor in the amusement park’s main warehouse for the last two years and was sometimes in charge of the storage area when the manager was off duty.

Huelsenbeck, who is prosecuting the case, outlined the elaborate one-man embezzlement operation in an interview after the hearing.

On Sept. 17, a man whose name authorities declined to release wanted to buy brand new Disneyland shirts and other souvenirs at a Thousand Oaks garage sale. He was told to write the check to an Anaheim man who sold the goods on consignment. Suspicious of the “cheap prices,” the buyer called a friend who worked for Disneyland’s security office, Huelsenbeck said.

That call prompted a Disney investigation which uncovered hundreds of thousands of dollars of missing merchandise going back almost a year, Huelsenbeck said. On Sept. 21, Disney security officials followed Schmitz as he drove a truckload of souvenirs and clothing to a Garden Grove store, which authorities refused to name. That night, Anaheim police arrested Schmitz at the amusement park.

According to Huelsenbeck, the owner of the Garden Grove store later told police that he had a “consignment arrangement” with Schmitz and that Schmitz had told him that he had a “special deal” to buy Disneyland goods.