Southern California official resigns and will plead guilty to COVID background investigation

SANTA ANA, Calif. – A top elected official in Orange County, Calif., has agreed to plead guilty to conspiracy to commit bribery as part of a scheme involving a charity and the misuse of relief funds from COVID-19, prosecutors said Tuesday.

Orange County Supervisor Andrew Do collected hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes while helping ensure the money went to an organization that claimed to feed the elderly and disabled, federal authorities said. Instead, the group used much of the funds to buy real estate, officials said.

Do, a Republican, resigned from his seat on the county board of 3 million people, effective immediately.

“Mr. You unequivocally break the public trust,” Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer said during a news conference with federal prosecutors.

Paul S. Meyer, Do’s attorney, declined to issue a statement out of respect for the legal process. “However, it is appropriate to convey Andrew Do’s sincere apology and deep sadness to his family, his District 1 constituents and his colleagues,” Meyer wrote in an email.

The case comes after a long-running investigation into the Viet America Society organization, where Do’s daughter, Rhiannon Do, was listed as an officer. Orange County, which lies between Los Angeles and San Diego, filed a civil lawsuit this year saying the group misused funds received during the pandemic to feed the elderly and disabled, instead of spending the money to buy real estate.

U.S. Attorney Martin Estrada said Andrew Do signed a deal to plead guilty to conspiracy to commit bribery in connection with the scheme and received more than $500,000 in payments for his role. While Andrew Do helped fund the meal program starting in 2020 and publicly touted the program’s benefits to the community, only 15% of the more than $9 million funneled to the Viet America Society they used for this purpose, Estrada said.

“The scheme basically worked like Robin Hood in reverse,” Estrada said. “Mr. Do and his co-conspirators stole money from the poor to give to themselves, and that money was intended to provide food to the people who needed it most in our community.”

Federal authorities seized $2.4 million in connection with the investigation, and Andrew Do agreed to give up any interest in that money and two homes in Orange County, Estrada said.

Do will appear in federal court to enter a plea, but a date for that hearing has not yet been set, Estrada said.

Estrada declined to answer reporters’ questions about whether Do’s wife, who is a judge in Orange County, was involved in the scheme. Estrada said the investigation was ongoing.

Supervisor Katrina Foley said she was “disgusted by the staggering level of corruption, greed and deceit described in the federal indictments.”

“Andrew Do and his enablers must pay the price for their crimes against the people of Orange County,” Foley said in a statement Tuesday.

Andrew Do was a Vietnamese refugee who became a prosecutor and city councilman before winning a seat to represent residents of the county’s First District on the five-person board of supervisors. The 1st District covers a cluster of communities, including the surf-friendly Huntington Beach.