MILWAUKEE, Oct. 12 (UPI) -- A former appointee of Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker to the Veterans Service Commission was convicted Friday of stealing funds intended for military veterans.
A jury in Milwaukee County found Kevin Kavanaugh, 62, guilty of stealing more than $51,000.
Kavanaugh could be sent to prison for as much as 10 years and fined as much as $25,000 when he is sentenced in December, the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reported.
Kavanaugh's attorney argued there was no evidence his client had spent the money on himself, and said Kavanaugh instead gave it to needy veterans personally, handing it out in increments of a few hundred dollars at a time, the newspaper said.
Christopher Hartley told the jury Kavanaugh was just "a very bad bookkeeper."
The conviction came one day after Kelly Rindfleisch pleaded guilty to felony misconduct for doing campaign work on county time as an aide to Scott Walker when he was Milwaukee County executive and the Republican candidate for governor.
Darlene Wink, a county employee when Walker was county executive, previously agreed to plead guilty to two misdemeanor charges of using public resources to raise funds for a political campaign. Wink faces a fine and a year in jail, and her plea agreement allows her to avoid time in jail.
Walker, who retained a defense attorney in February and started a legal defense fund in March, had been on a list of prosecution witnesses for Rindfleisch's trial.
