An attorney for Dana Williamson, Gavin Newsom’s ex-aide who pled guilty to her involvement in a $225,000 scheme to steal campaign funds, claims she was only “helping a friend in a hard time” — as the disgraced Sacramento power brokerseeks a light sentence for her admitted crimes.

McGregor Scott, Williamson’s defense attorney, said she didn’t hatch the plan to skim thousands from ex-attorney general andDemocratic frontrunner for governorXavier Becerra’s dormant campaign fund into accounts she controlled.

“This idea to take money from the Becerra account originated with Sean McCluskie,” Scott told reporters outside Robert T. Matsui U.S. Courthouse in Sacramento Thursday.

“This was his idea, he chased my client repeatedly,” he added, citing relentless text message and meeting requests about the fraud scheme.

Dana Williamson’s attorney McGregor Scott says at sentencing they will argue she was trying to help a friend.Williamson has pleaded guilty in case where she helped Xavier Becerra’s longtime chief of staff steal funds from his campaign account.pic.twitter.com/ne4ihgjSFp

McCluskie’s wife was paid $10,000 per month for a no-show job while her husband was working as chief of staff for Becerra while he was head of Health and Human Services under former President Joe Biden.

McCluskie, who pled guilty in connection with the scheme last year, had complained about needing more money, according to charging documents.

Williamson admitted to counts of conspiracy to commit bank and wire fraud, subscribing to a false tax return and making false statements after she was accused of helping to skim $225,000 from Becerra’s campaign account, falsely claiming lavish personal spending as business expenses and lying to the FBI about passing along proprietary government information to business contacts.

Read Williamson’s plea deal here.

Scott said he plans to argue that Wiliamson’s motives were “altruistic heartrending” in asking the court for a light sentence — claiming she lost money in the fraud and was only “trying to help a friend in a hard time.”

Source: California Post – Breaking California News, Photos & Videos