Local News in Brief : Embezzler Gets 4 Years
A Pasadena Superior Court judge sentenced Eugene M. Giometti, a former Glendale Bar Assn. president, to four years in prison Friday for embezzling more than $200,000 from a dozen clients during a two-year period beginning in 1983.
Giometti, 41, showed no emotion as he was sentenced on 11 counts of embezzlement and one count of forgery.
In a plea bargain agreement in February, 16 counts of grand theft and forgery were dismissed. At that time, Giometti pleaded no contest to the 12 remaining counts against him.
Included among those he bilked were two widows who entrusted money from their husbands’ life insurance policies to him, prosecutors said. He stole the money by diverting it from trust funds to his private accounts or by forging his clients’ names on insurance checks, authorities said.
Giometti stole the most money--$99,000--from Drue Delgado, a waitress widowed and left to care for her then-2-year-old son when her husband was murdered in North Hollywood, authorities said.
Giometti blamed his downfall on a severe drinking problem.
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