Federal prosecutors said that during a five-month period in 2023, the former employee ordered 240 new government cellphones sent to his Maryland home.
WASHINGTON — A former U.S. House staffer was arrested on suspicion of stealing nearly 240 government cellphones, valued at $150,000, federal prosecutors said on Monday.
According to the office of U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro, Christopher Southerland, 43, worked as an administrator for the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure from April 2020 to July 2023. Part of his job was to order cellphones for committee staff members.
Federal prosecutors said that from January to May 2023, Southerland used his position to order 240 government cellphones to be shipped to his Maryland home. At the time, only about 80 staff members were on the committee.
Southerland is accused of selling more than 200 phones to a nearby pawn shop.
Court documents show Southerland was indicted last month on a charge that he “willfully and knowingly embezzled, stole and converted to his own use cellular telephones” that belonged to the government. He was arrested last week.
Federal officials accused Southerland of directing an employee at the pawn shop to sell the phone “in parts” only to bypass the U.S. House’s mobile device management software, which “enables the House to remotely secure and monitor its phones.”
The alleged scheme was first discovered when one of the phones that Southerland is accused of stealing was sold in its entirety on eBay. When the buyer first turned on the phone, it displayed a phone number for the House of Representatives Technology Service Desk.
The buyer then called that number, and congressional employees discovered that several phones purchased by Southerland were unaccounted for.