Sonora man arrested on suspicion of embezzling tens of thousands from local newspaper
A Sonora man was arrested on felony charges after he allegedly embezzled the small town’s newspaper out of $20,000 between 2021 and 2023, according to police.
While working as an advertisement salesman for the Union Democrat, Justin Daniel Jones, 35, reportedly offered local businesses discounts on ads that didn’t actually exist — then pocketed the money for himself.
The Sonora Police Department launched a five-month investigation that resulted in an arrest warrant for Jones, who turned himself into the Dambacher Detention Center on Nov. 9. He was released hours later after posting a $30,000 bond.
The Union Democrat itself published an article about the incident on Friday, which detailed how the paper discovered the suspected scam and how it’s now dealing with the situation.
The paper’s publisher, Peggy Pietrowicz, filed a police report just days after laying off Jones due to cutbacks. Pietrowicz said she found out after calling her customers regarding late invoices and was told they’d already paid.
Jones had a recently hired accountant forward all of the invoices directly to him, unbeknownst to Pietrowicz, and then sent out fake contracts for deals that weren’t real.
Pietrowicz said she was disheartened that someone she’d known for four years would do something like this, particularly in such a tight-knit community. She’d known his family for years and her daughter and Jones’ sister were good friends. Jones worked for the Union Democrat from 2019 until he was laid off in May.
“It was just a real shock to everybody that he would do something like that to try to hurt the newspaper,” Pietrowicz told The Modesto Bee. “You know, (especially) as hard as it is to be in the newspaper business right now.”
The Union Democrat has 10 staff members, with Pietrowicz wearing many hats, doing whatever is needed around the office. After Jones was laid off, she started collecting on overdue payments. She said even if Jones wasn’t laid off, she was days away from finding out anyway — as many of the payments were near or over 120 days old.
Once the alleged scheme was discovered, Pietrowicz said her first concern was her customers — all small local businesses she’d been working with for 20 years.
Pietrowicz said once her customers found out what happened, they provided her with copies of the checks. Pietrowicz said she’s since set aside money so that her customers’ accounts reflect that they had paid.
As for how it affected the paper, Pietrowicz said that sales are good enough to stay afloat and the staff are making due to continue delivering local news.
“I don’t know what he’s doing with the money but I hope it was worth it to him, because he’s a local guy,” Pietrowicz said.
This story was originally published November 24, 2023 at 3:11 PM.
