Benefits worker pleads guilty to stealing EBT cards in Madera, records say
A Madera County social services employee who worked with the elderly and Spanish-speakers has pleaded guilty to stealing about $40,000 in government assistance, federal prosecutors said on Tuesday.
Leticia Mariscal, 55, of Madera stole CalFresh money and EBT cards between 2020 and 2025 by using the identities of county residents until she was suspected of the theft and placed on leave, according to court records.
She pleaded guilty to a single count of aggravated identity theft in the federal case and faces two years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000, prosecutors said. Her sentencing hearing was set for April 13.
Her attorney declined to comment on Tuesday.
Mariscal’s theft was discovered when another county worker noticed a 97-year-old was missing a form in their file that could cause them to lose CalFresh benefits. That worker called the beneficiary’s son and learned the 97-year-old had not applied for the benefits, according to court records.
In all, Mariscal used the identities of 15 people to collect the money meant for low-income residents who need food assistance and used it on 900 transactions, records show. She and her relatives spent the EBT dollars at stores and on smartphones at Vons, Costco, Sam’s Club and CashApp, an application for smartphones.
A phone number investigators said they tracked to Mariscal was found linked to rewards programs for those stores and the EBT cards used in Fresno and Madera counties, court records show.
She also used the information of residents who were deceased, records show.
Prosecutors said she contacted non-citizens who were getting CalFresh benefits and falsely told them they had to appear with certain immigration documents in an attempt to intimidate those non-citizens and steal their information.
