Months after his arrest, prosecutors have filed a grand theft charge against a Delray Beach Police officer after he allegedly stole $1,500 from the department’s Vice Intelligence Unit fund, court records show.
Officer Matthew Cusson was arrested in April after a supervisor recognized the money was missing, the city said in a news release at the time.
The Palm Beach County State Attorney’s Office filed the charge on Thursday.
A Delray Beach sergeant, who has for the past two years kept the Vice Unit’s money in a cash box locked inside of a safe in his office, noticed on April 16 that a stack of $20 bills were gone, according to a probable cause affidavit. Less than $500 was left in the box that afternoon, and the stack of bills was noticeably thinner than when he last checked the night before.
Delray Beach Police officer accused of taking $1,500 from Vice Unit fund
The unit’s agents investigate narcotics-related crimes, according to the affidavit. The names of all agents and supervisors involved are redacted in the affidavit because they work undercover.
Two agents were given a total of $800 from the fund on April 15 to use during an investigation. They returned more than $600 after they finished their duties, according to the affidavit.
The sergeant told the PBSO deputy investigating the theft that he may have left the safe unlocked afterward because he was multi-tasking. He noticed the money was missing shortly after noon the next day, though the safe had by then been closed and locked.
A Delray Beach crime scene investigator swabbed the cash box and the money clip inside it for latent finger prints and DNA, the affidavit said. The identities of the people that the three swabs traced back to are redacted in the affidavit.
On April 17, the day the fingerprint results had been confirmed, one agent made “an alarming comment” to the sergeant, according to the affidavit: “I’ll lawyer up and resign, since people seem to be pointing fingers.”
A spokesperson for the police department did not respond to an email seeking information about Cusson’s status Monday. He was previously placed on administrative leave after his arrest while the criminal investigation and an internal investigation were pending.
He was sworn in as a member of the police department in February 2020, according to a post on the police department’s Facebook page.
The arraignment is scheduled for Sept. 9, court records show. His attorney did not respond to a voicemail or email seeking comment Monday.
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