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A former Hidalgo County Sheriff’s Office evidence technician is scheduled to be arraigned Monday on a 22-count indictment accusing him of stealing nearly $30,000 and taking a gun storage box last year.
A grand jury on April 25 indicted 37-year-old Raymondville resident Miguel David Soliz on 21 counts of tampering with a government record and a single count of theft of property in the amount of $30,000 to $150,000.
The sheriff’s office announced that investigators had arrested Soliz in June 2022 following an internal investigation prompted by one of Soliz’s colleagues who noticed missing cash while handling a currency evidence box.
A probable cause affidavit for his arrest said the tech who noticed the missing money ran an inquiry that revealed modifications to computerized evidence logs, which triggered that internal investigation.
The sheriff’s office said after his arrest that Soliz confessed. The investigation leading to the arrest lasted about a week.
Investigators allege that the investigation showed Soliz made modifications to the logs, which are governmental records, by using various employee identifications to steal the cash.
The alleged scheme lasted for several months, spanning from March 14, 2022 to June 10, 2022, according to the indictment.
The affidavit for his arrest said investigators recovered currency and the stolen gun storage box from a safe, though that document does not say how much cash investigators accuse him of stealing.
However, in a news release, the sheriff’s office said he stole $28,576.
Soliz was booked into the Hidalgo County Adult Detention Center on June 20, 2022 and bailed out on July 18, 2022 on a total of $55,000 in bonds.
