Convicted Deputy Gets Home Sentence
Because of severe health problems, a retired Ventura County sheriff’s deputy avoided a federal prison term Thursday for his role in a billing and kickback scheme at Point Mugu Navy Base. Instead, he was ordered confined to his home for a year.
The conviction and sentence of Anthony Ditzhazy brought to a close a three-year federal probe of bribes and kickback scams at the Navy base and at Unocal’s Ventura County oil platforms in the mid-1980s that resulted in 11 convictions.
He was also fined $10,000 and ordered to perform 300 hours of community service when his home-confinement sentence ends.
Ditzhazy, 56, owned a machinery supply company in Camarillo that submitted phony invoices to the base. Two workers at the base signed off the invoices and Ditzhazy split the $130,000 with them between 1987 and 1989.
Ditzhazy retired as a Ventura County sheriff’s lieutenant in 1991 after a 30-year career.
He pleaded guilty last year to one count of fraud and one count of income-tax evasion. His lawyer, Howard Beckler, said Ditzhazy suffers from several ailments, including diabetes, and requires a breathing apparatus at night.
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