Ex-police officer pleads guilty to gas thefts

WEST CHESTER » A former parttime police officer pleaded guilty on Monday to filling up his personal vehicles with gasoline using the credit card issued by the South Coatesville Police department for official use.

Salvatore A. Cracchiolo, who worked both in South Coatesville and Malvern over the past few years, was caught on surveillance video pumping gas into his SUVs at a gasoline station in Caln on three different occasions while he was on duty.

An investigation of departmen-

tal records in South Coatesville by a Chester County detective found that Cracchiolo had used the borough’s fuel credit cards for gasoline purchases that routinely exceeded the number of gallons that its patrol cars could actually hold.

The part-time officer admitted using the department’s fuel cards to fill his personal vehicles when interview by county Detective Keith Cowdright in May.

Accompanied to court by his attorney, Thomas H. Ramsay of West Chester, Cracchiolo pleaded guilty to charges of theft by unlawful taking and access device fraud, both misdemeanors. He was sentenced to eight years of probation, and ordered to complete 400 hours of community service. He must also write a letter of apology to the South Coatesville Police Department; he has already repaid the $4,700 worth of gas the investigation determined he stole.

Ramsay said that his client had been dismissed from his positions at both South Coatesville and Malvern after his arrest on the charges in June. He now works for his family’s restaurant business.

Cracchiolo, 29, of King of Prussia, told Common Pleas Judge James P. MacElree II, who accepted the plea and approved the sentence negotiated by Ramsay and Assistant District Attorney Christopher Miller, that he accepted responsibility for his crime. He promised never to do anything like it again.

According to Cowdright’s criminal complaint, the thefts were reported to his office by the borough in April. He said that interviews showed that officers such as Cracchiolo were not permitted to use the borough’s fuel cards to fill up their own vehicles.

But records from January 2015 through January 2017 showed that Cracchiolo routinely would use the fuel cards at the Pacific Pride fuel station on North Caln Road twice in a relatively short period of time, one apparently legitimate for his patrol car and one for his personal cars. The patrol cars had a maximum fuel capacity of 19 gallons, his SUVs from 25 to 39 gallons.

“In short, the records showed the defendant using more fuel than a (police) vehicle could take, but which matched the fuel capacity of his personal vehicle,” Cowdright wrote.

The detective’s analysis of the borough’s fuel records showed that Cracchiolo used the card for his personal use 133 times during the 24 months he reviewed. When Cowdright interviewed him, Cracchiolo admitted using the cards two to three times a week.

He was charged in June, and has been free on bail since.