Former County Official DeWitt Pleads Guilty to Felony Count

Kevin DeWitt, the county’s former mental health administrator, pleaded guilty Tuesday to a single felony count of using forged documents to obtain an $83,000-a-year job.

In entering the plea, DeWitt admitted to presenting a phony doctoral diploma to secure his former position as deputy director of the county’s Behavioral Health Department in 1996.

DeWitt, 40, was scheduled to appear later this month for a preliminary hearing on forgery and grand theft charges for allegedly swindling the county out of more than $250,000 in wages over three years.

He previously denied the charges but changed his plea during a hearing Tuesday in Ventura County Superior Court.

Although he faces up to three years in prison, DeWitt is expected to serve a lesser sentence in County Jail and be placed on probation as a result of a conditional plea agreement.

“I believe he will serve some time in jail,” said Deputy Dist. Atty. Terence Kilbride, who will ask that the grand theft charge be dismissed at a March 14 sentencing hearing.

The prosecutor said he would be “very shocked” if DeWitt walked away from the hearing with only probation based on his conduct and prior criminal history.

A decade ago, DeWitt was convicted of eight bank fraud charges after admitting that he wrote fake references on loan documents while working as a junior loan officer at a bank in Louisville, Ky.

DeWitt said he created the phony references in an effort to process more loans and please his bosses. The bank lost an estimated $26 million in defaulted loans as a result of his actions, officials said.

Kilbride said DeWitt subsequently served 45 days in a work-release program, paid a $40,000 fine and was placed on two years’ probation.

Years later, DeWitt lied on employment forms about the federal convictions, and gave Ventura County officials bogus university transcripts and a phony 1993 doctoral diploma from the University of Kentucky, Kilbride said.

While it is not a crime to create phony documents, it is illegal to present them when applying for a job, Kilbride said, adding that he was not aware how DeWitt obtained the fake diploma.

“It could have been made on someone’s home computer for all I know,” he said.

DeWitt’s criminal past was uncovered by FBI agents last year as they conducted an unrelated investigation into improper billings in the county’s Behavioral Health Department.

Federal agents were trying to determine if mental health managers had deliberately defrauded the Medicare program when they found evidence of DeWitt’s previous conviction, Kilbride said.

DeWitt is not accused of playing a role in the Medicare scandal.

Sitting in the back of the courtroom Tuesday, DeWitt declined comment on his guilty plea and referred reporters to his attorney, David Follin.

“Not at this time,” Follin later responded when asked to discuss the case. “After the sentencing, we’d be happy to talk.”

DeWitt resigned in August after news reports disclosed that he lied about his past when seeking the county job.

DeWitt told The Times that he failed to inform the county of the felony bank fraud convictions because several years had passed and he didn’t think that he was obligated to disclose them.

In addition to jail time, DeWitt also faces a hefty fee when he is sentenced.

Prosecutors contend that DeWitt was not entitled to the $250,000 in wages he earned during his county employment because he lied to get the job.

Kilbride intends to ask Superior Court Judge Bruce Clark to order DeWitt to pay back the money.

DeWitt, a Camarillo resident, remains free on $10,000 bail.