A Sacramento youth football coach pleaded innocent Friday to federal charges that he conspired with a state Insurance Department official to steal $263,000.
Brian "B.T." Thompson is charged with defrauding a nonprofit organization funded with settlements between the department and insurers accused of mishandling claims arising from the 1994 Northridge earthquake.
He remains free without bond pending a Jan. 31 status hearing. His attorney, Peter Kmeto, did not immediately return a telephone message left by the Associated Press seeking comment.
The five-count indictment, handed down Thursday, also accuses him of conspiring with former Deputy Insurance Commissioner George Grays to launder money they allegedly took from the nonprofit organization.
Thompson, 36, also is charged with obstructing justice by submitting falsified records to the grand jury.
Grays, 38, pleaded guilty Tuesday to mail fraud and money-laundering and is cooperating with the government. His sentencing is set for April 12.
Chuck Quackenbush resigned as insurance commissioner last summer after his secret settlements with insurers became public. He required earthquake insurance companies to pay approximately $12.8 million to the nonprofit corporation he had created to receive the funds.
Prosecutors say Grays controlled the corporation as it handed out $6 million in grants to various nonprofit entities between July 1999 and January 2000.
Among the grants was $263,000 that went to Skillz Athletics Foundation, a corporation Thompson set up in September 1999 to help "at-risk athletes."
Thompson owned the foundation's predecessor, a for-profit proprietorship that ran youth football camps in Sacramento -- one of which was attended by Quackenbush's sons. He is alleged to have made illegal kickbacks to Grays of $170,900, and spent the rest of the money for personal purposes.<
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