n Cody Andrew Bakken, 17, of Sunburg, pleaded guilty Monday to an amended charge of gross misdemeanor forgery for aiding in the offering of a forged check.
As part of a plea agreement, the charge was reduced from a felony. He was sentenced to six months of probation and 16 hours of community service work and ordered to pay $320 in restitution and write an apology letter to the woman whose checks were forged in the case.
Felony matters against 16-and 17-year-olds are public record.
The charge was filed after the Kandiyohi County Sheriff's Office received a report from the Benson Police Department on Dec. 13 that two forged checks had been written to Pete's Surplus Store, rural New London, on a Benson woman's closed bank account. The checks, both for $130, had been written on Nov. 29 and Dec. 2. The woman went to the store, talked to the owner and learned that Bakken was the store attendant who cashed the checks for another teenager. When interviewed, Bakken said Steven Jon Lynn Horton, 18, of Sunburg, who has also been charged with forgery, wrote the checks and that no one else was in the store when the checks were written and cashed.
- Jorge Alberto Ibarra, also known as Jorge Alberto Ibarra-Saenz, 28, of Willmar, pleaded guilty Monday to two felony charges of aggravated forgery.
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As part of a plea agreement reached in Kandiyohi County District Court, two additional felonies for forgery, a gross misdemeanor for giving a peace officer a false name and misdemeanors for violating Department of Natural Resources restrictions on taking fish and for fishing without a license will be dismissed. Ibarra is also known as Fernando P. Gonzales Jr.
The charges were filed after a June 3 incident in which two DNR conservation officers went to a home in Regency Estates East to investigate a report of two individuals taking multiple northern pike from Foot Lake. The men were using a landing net to take the fish. They met a man who claimed he and a friend caught a number of carp with the net, which was now at his home. The officers were allowed to inspect the fish, including five northerns and one carp.
Ibarra showed up at the home, but denied fishing with the man. However, the man identified Ibarra as fishing with him in Foot Lake. Officers asked for identification, and Ibarra gave them a fishing license and a Minnesota identification card in the Gonzales name. The officers ran the name through State Patrol dispatch and were notified that the ID was flagged as stolen from someone in Texas. When asked for further forms of identification, Ibarra gave officers a Social Security card, banking card and a YMCA card in the Gonzales name.
A Willmar police officer arrived and ran the name through local dispatch and found that it was flagged for ID theft and linked to Ibarra. At that point, Ibarra said he had purchased the identification about five years ago. He was arrested.
In an interview at the jail, Ibarra said he received the state identification card five years ago and renewed it recently. He admitted he was a citizen of Mexico and when he first came to Minnesota, he was denied a state identification card because he had no Social Security number. He said he purchased a forged birth certificate and Social Security number at Regency Estates West for $1,000. He also admitted to being pulled over by law enforcement and to using both names. Further investigation revealed that his 2007 and 2008 fishing licenses were both purchased from Willmar retailers.
He will be sentenced July 25.
- Humberto Acevedo Jr., 26, of Willmar, was sentenced to a $1,500 fine and five years of probation on a fifth-degree controlled substance felony charge.
He was ordered to serve 77 days in jail, with credit for 77 days already served and was ordered to complete a chemical dependency evaluation. Judge Donald M. Spilseth ordered that adjudication be withheld, meaning that if Acevedo complies with the court conditions, the conviction will not appear on his record.
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As part of a plea agreement, the charge was reduced from a third degree drug possession charge for possessing three or more grams of cocaine, methamphetamine or heroin and a gross misdemeanor for introducing contraband into the county jail was dismissed.
The charges were filed after a Willmar officer stopped a vehicle for making an illegal turn around 2:30 a.m. April 21. Acevedo was a passenger in the vehicle and was arrested on an outstanding warrant from Swift County. He was taken to the jail and during a routine search, jail officials found 5.1 grams of methamphetamine on his person.
