Prosecutors are seeking additional criminal charges against the former superintendent of the Beverly Hills Unified School District.
Jeffrey Hubbard, 54, who now serves as the top official at Newport-Mesa Unified School District in Orange County, faces two felony counts of misappropriation of funds related to his former job, the Daily Pilot reported.
The Los Angeles County district attorney's office plans to take recently acquired evidence to a grand jury in hopes of securing additional charges and possibly joining them with the two felony charges the D.A.'s office already filed.
"We learned of the details that give us a reason to file additional charges fairly late in the game," Deputy Dist. Atty. Max Huntsman said after Hubbard's pretrial hearing Friday.
Huntsman declined to specify what the possible charges would involve, saying only that they would be similar to the counts already filed.
Huntsman said the D.A.'s office received the evidence after Hubbard had already been charged with the first two felonies, and expediting the process with a grand jury allows his counsel to join the cases and save time.
Hubbard's attorney, Sal Ciulla, said in court that if additional charges were brought he would fight them. Hubbard has pleaded not guilty to the other two counts and has said that he would not accept a plea bargain.
The D.A.'s office was unable to present its additional evidence to a grand jury previously because of a scheduling conflict, but plans on making the case for more charges before Hubbard's trial begins, tentatively on Nov. 10, Huntsman said.
The other defendant in the case, Karen Anne Christiansen, to whom Hubbard is accused of making payments without required school board approval, is expected to go to trial the same day.
Hubbard is accused of giving Christiansen an additional $500 for a car allowance and about $20,000 without the approval of the school board for BHUSD, where he worked as a superintendent before joining Newport-Mesa in 2006.
If Hubbard does not go to trial in mid-November, the case will probably begin after the winter holidays. His trial is expected to last seven days or less.
Hubbard took a leave from Newport-Mesa to prepare for the trial but is back on the job this fall. Several members of the school board have stood by him, saying they believe he is innocent.
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-- Lauren Willaims, Times Community News
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