Federal Plea For Former Alcorn County Official

CORINTH, MS) WCBI – The first domino in a widespread Alcorn County corruption case has fallen. Former Alcorn County purchasing clerk Paul Rhodes is pleading guilty to federal fraud charges.

Rhodes

Rhodes is waiving a federal indictment and agreeing to the claims made in a criminal information.  The government claims Rhodes sent fake invoices to the Mississippi  Department of  Environmental Quality for cleaning up illegal dump and waste sites.  The only problem..those dump sites did not exist or were never cleaned up.  Rhodes is being prosecuted in federal court because he used the mail to submit the fake charges.  Rhodes could be sentenced to 20 years in federal prison and fined up to a quarter million dollars