The U.S. attorney's office says Richard Norton milked the city, the state and the federal government out of thousands of dollars meant for Fresno's poor.
Forty seven year old Richard Norton was first arrested last October when police say an alert security guard at Macy's saw him leaving the store with designer purses stuffed in his pants.
Norton was a 22-year employee at Macy's and just days away from retiring. He worked part time making $19 an hour.
But Fresno police believe Norton had been stealing designer purses, perfume and jeans from the store over a four year period and selling the goods on eBay.
When he was arrested in October, police say Norton had over $5,000 in various bank accounts, almost $350,000 in Pay-Pal, an online payment account, and over $150,000 in cash.
Neighbors say they never interacted with Norton but they noticed his cars.
Eduardo Sarabia says, "He showed up in pretty cool cars all of a sudden - I mean he used to have cars, but not that nice cars, all of a sudden he showed up with nice cars, I thought, "Wow, he must be doing really good in his job."
Norton appeared in federal court Friday afternoon and pleaded not guilty to charges related to the Macy's thefts and subsequent sales on eBay but he's also facing four counts of mail fraud.
The U.S. attorney's office says Norton applied for and received more than $25,000 from Fresno's home improvement program.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Kirk Sheriff says, "Those funds were intended for low income recipients to restore and repair health and safety issues in homes and the allegation is that he submitted false and fraudulent information in the application."
Norton says he's not guilty of the mail fraud charges either. The court released him into his mother's custody; he could face up to 70 years in prison if convicted on all charges.
