Orange County Criminal Defense

LAPD Officer Convicted of Theft and Burglary in Laguna Beach

July 31, 2012

Fred Thiagarajah

LAPD officer Jeffry Quinton pled guilty to a court offer of one felony count of grand theft by an employee (a violation of Penal Code section 487(b)(3)) and one felony count of second degree burglary, also known as commercial burglary (a violation of Penal Code section 459-460(b)), today.  Quinton was moonlighting as a security guard at a Laguna Beach hotel and was discovered to have stolen, on three separate occasions, including stealing cash from “lost and found”, stealing cash from a safe deposit box, and stealing bedding from a locked storage room.  The total value of restitution that was ordered by the judge was over $3000.

Quinton was charged with two felony counts — grand theft and burglary.  Each of these charges is a wobbler and the maximum penalty for each of the charges is 3 years state prison.  However, under the sentencing rules, the maximum penalty for both charges combined would be 3 years, 8 months.  Any defendant can either reach a deal with the prosecution or plead guilty to a court offer, but a court offer usually involves pleading guilty to all of the charges listed.  In this case, the prosecution was asking for one year in custody, but the court offered Quinton 120 days in custody.  Quinton accepted the court’s offer and pled guilty to both felony offenses and was sentenced to 3 years formal probation, 120 days jail and restitution.  The court allowed the defendant the opportunity to serve that 120 days jail as either secured electronic confinement (also known as house arrest) or in a city jail (also known as private jail), if either option was available.

Either during his probation or after his probation is terminated, Quinton will have the opportunity to request that his felonies be reduced to misdemeanors pursuant to Penal Code section 17b.  Furthermore, after successfully completing probation, Quinton can his convictions expunged pursuant to Penal Code section 1203.4.  Quinton will be terminated from the LAPD as a police officer cannot serve in the LAPD with a felony conviction.

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