United States Department of Justice

United States Attorney Joseph P. Russoniello
Northern District of California

OAKLAND – United States Attorney Joseph P. Russoniello announced that Lindsay Bertelson was sentenced to twelve months in prison and ordered to pay $60,219 in restitution for embezzling funds from her former employer, PepsiCo, by misusing company credit cards for personal use. This sentence is the result of an investigation by the United States Postal Inspection Service.

Ms. Bertelson pleaded guilty on January 10, 2008, to one count of mail fraud, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1341. According to the plea agreement, Ms. Bertelson admitted that from August 2000 through March 2005, she worked as an administrative assistant with PepsiCo in Pleasanton, California. As part of her employment, Ms. Bertelson received credit cards to make authorized purchases for PepsiCo. Ms. Bertelson used those credit cards to make unauthorized personal purchases in excess of $60,000 at costco.com, Kinkos, the Venetian Hotel in Las Vegas, and other businesses. Ms. Bertelson then submitted those expenses to PepsiCo for payment.

Ms. Bertelson, 29, of Union City, California, was charged by Information on December 7, 2007, with five counts of mail fraud. The sentence was handed down by U.S. District Court Judge Sandra B. Armstrong following Ms. Bertelson’s guilty plea. Judge Armstrong also sentenced Ms. Bertelson to a three year period of supervised release. The defendant will begin serving the sentence on June 13, 2008.

Shashi Kewalramani and Daniel Kaleba are the Assistant U.S. Attorneys who prosecuted the case with the assistance of Cynthia Daniel and Katie Turner.

Further Information:             

Case #: CR 07-0780 SBA

A copy of this press release may be found on the U.S. Attorney’s Office’s website at www.usdoj.gov/usao/can.

Electronic court filings and further procedural and docket information are available at https://ecf.cand.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/login.pl.

Judges’ calendars with schedules for upcoming court hearings can be viewed on the court’s website at www.cand.uscourts.gov.

All press inquiries to the U.S. Attorney’s Office should be directed to Joshua Eaton at (415) 436-6958 or by email at Josh.Eaton@usdoj.gov.