YAKIMA – A lawyer accused of taking thousands of dollars from a Kennewick youth program has pleaded innocent to federal bribery and conspiracy charges.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Michael Leavitt entered a not guilty plea for Jeff L. Finney, of Benton City, and allowed the former defense lawyer to remain free without bond during an initial court appearance Wednesday.
Finney, 50, is charged with one count of bribery and one count of conspiracy to aid and abet in the theft of at least $20,000. Conviction on each charge carries a sentence of up to 10 years in prison and $250,000 in fines.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Greg Shogren said Finney has cooperated for months with the investigation in the case, which the Tri-City Herald reported involves between $50,000 to $140,000 missing from the city of Kennewick’s Home Base youth program.
Finney was a lawyer on contract to Benton County defending people charged in county District Court when he allegedly stole money in 2005 that defendants donated to the youth program in exchange for promises of reduced or dismissed charges.
A yearlong FBI investigation focused on Finney and Tyler M. Morris, 36, a former assistant city prosecutor for Kennewick.
Finney and Morris, of Walla Walla, lost their jobs after the newspaper published stories about the missing money. Morris has yet to appear in federal court on similar federal charges.
The Herald discovered that in some cases criminal charges were dismissed or reduced for defendants, but their cash donations, which had been encouraged by Finney and Morris as a way to resolve the cases, didn’t make it to the city’s Home Base account.
The stories also prompted the cities of Kennewick, Richland, Pasco and West Richland to cancel their own versions of dollars-for-deals programs.
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