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Ogden • A Clearfield man convicted of stealing money from intellectually disabled residents of the group home he supervised was sentenced to jail Wednesday.
Before handing down the 180-day sentence, 2nd District Judge Ernie Jones told 29-year-old Jordan Jeffrey Jack that the fact that he violated the trust of vulnerable people was key in the case.
"They put you in a position of trust and you took advantage of them," Jones said Wednesday at Jack's sentencing hearing. "… It's not just about the amount of money. It is significant because of who you preyed upon in this case. They were elderly people, they were disabled people. People that relied on you."
After a two-day bench trial in August, Jack was found guilty of seven counts of exploitation of a vulnerable adult, a third-degree felony. Jones also found Jack guilty of communications fraud, a second-degree felony, and misdemeanor theft by deception. The felony convictions carried a possible prison sentence, but Jones suspended the prison time and instead ordered Jack to serve in the Weber County jail. He will spend 90 days behind bars and the other 90 in home confinement. He was also ordered to pay more than $11,000 in restitution to 14 victims.
Jack's attorney, Kelly Booth, had asked Jones to sentence her client to only home confinement and ankle monitoring, saying that he now worked as a stay-at-home dad to his three children since he was fired last year from his position as assistant director at Chrysalis, a Weber County-based group home.
Booth told the judge that Jack — who has no other criminal history — took the money from the residents as a way to "keep up with the Joneses." She said he, like many young people living in Utah, felt pressure to marry young, start a family and buy a home. She said many of the items Jack purchased with the stolen money, such as coloring books, stickers and jewelry, were for his wife and children.
But assistant attorney general Kaye Lynn Wootton argued that the items Jack bought "were not necessities," and she pointed to evidence that the defendant spent several days in Las Vegas staying in a hotel that cost more than $400 per night.
While working at Chrysalis, prosecutors say Jack used "false receipts and altered financial statements to deceive his employer and steal money from over 14 residents of the group homes he supervised." Wootton said this went on from 2012 until Jack was fired in 2014.
On Wednesday, Jack was apologetic and said he was sorry to the victims, to his co-workers and to his family.
"I really cared about them," he said of the residents. "I know my actions indicate otherwise. … I was supposed to be an example and a leader, and I was more of a hypocrite."
None of the victims spoke in court Wednesday, but Troy Friden, a Chrysalis area director, told the judge of how difficult it was to notify their clients and their families of the crimes. He said one mother had asked him not to tell her disabled son about it because he thought so highly of Jack.
"These people trusted our employees would take care of their family members," he said. "… It was really their trust that he violated."