Ventura County Sheriff – Incident Press Release
In early June of 2019, detectives from the Moorpark Police Department Investigations Bureau initiated an investigation into a very elaborate embezzlement scheme involving the mortgage company, PennyMac LLC. The scheme involved a former employee identified as Joe Rodriguez of North Hollywood. The embezzlement was discovered by PennyMac Management after Rodriguez was laid off from the company for unrelated reasons.
During the course of their investigation, detectives learned that Rodriguez, who worked in the Human Resources Division, altered the payroll earnings for several employees and stole the marked-up earnings, which totaled several thousand dollars each month. The scheme continued for over two years, until Rodriguez was laid off in March of 2019.
On the morning of September 12th, 2019, detectives from the Moorpark Investigations Bureau, with the assistance of deputies from the Thousand Oaks Station Directed Enforcement Unit, served a residential search warrant at Rodriguez’ home in North Hollywood, as well as a warrant ordering the seizure of assets on Rodriguez’ bank accounts. Rodriguez was arrested during the search warrant and a significant amount of evidence was recovered, including a large sum of cash.
Rodriguez was subsequently booked at the Ventura County Jail on several counts of Grand Theft and money laundering and his bail has been set at $2,000.000.00.