{"id":50845,"date":"2020-10-23T00:22:07","date_gmt":"2020-10-23T06:22:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/former-cortez-finance-director-sentenced-to-30-days-in-jail\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:53:21","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T09:53:21","slug":"former-cortez-finance-director-sentenced-to-30-days-in-jail","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/former-cortez-finance-director-sentenced-to-30-days-in-jail\/","title":{"rendered":"Former Cortez finance director sentenced to 30 days in jail"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Kathi
Kathi Moss, former finance director for the city of Cortez<\/span>du1-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The former Cortez finance director was sentenced to 30 days in jail, two years of probation and a restitution payment of over $78,000 Thursday after pleading guilty to embezzlement of public property.<\/p>\n

Katheryn Moss, 70, pleaded guilty to a Class 5 felony charge of embezzling $63,642 from the city of Cortez between Jan. 1, 2016, and Dec. 31, 2018.<\/p>\n

District Attorney Will Furse said Moss was \u201cquite candid in her remarks\u201d to officials working on the case, which \u201cshed light on her familial experiences and mental health issues.\u201d<\/p>\n

Moss admitted her involvement with the embezzlement and \u201cdid the right thing in that regard,\u201d Furse said.<\/p>\n

The former finance director has no prior criminal record beyond the embezzlement. But the amount of money embezzled and the length of time Moss was involved in the embezzlement is \u201cnothing short of public corruption,\u201d Furse said.<\/p>\n

Moss took steps to \u201cdestroy evidence\u201d and \u201ccover her tracks,\u201d and the city of Cortez will \u201cnever know how much she took,\u201d Furse said. He asked the judge to give Moss 90 days of jail time, the maximum rehabilitation sentence.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe city of Cortez wished for the highest, most severe punishment available,\u201d Furse said. \u201cI\u2019m not naive to the hardships she will endure, but I believe it to be appropriate.\u201d<\/p>\n

Laurie Black, a former utility billing clerk for the city, said she worked for Moss for 27 years.<\/p>\n

Black said the judge should give Moss the full three months in jail for the \u201charm she has done to the city of Cortez, which is literally floundering\u201d financially.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe needs to set an example,\u201d Black said.<\/p>\n

Moss\u2019s attorney, Richard Jaye, said he understood the DA\u2019s position, but noted Moss has been cooperative with Furse and the Colorado Bureau of Investigation.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom the beginning, there has been no indication she wasn\u2019t taking full responsibility for her actions,\u201d Jaye said.<\/p>\n

Given Moss\u2019s age and her lack of criminal history, Jaye said 90 days in jail would not accomplish anything for the people of Cortez.<\/p>\n

\u201cI understand everyone wants their pound of flesh,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

At 70 years old, Moss likely would contract COVID-19 and suffer in jail, Jaye said. Moss is repaying the amount CBI could prove she had taken, and is essentially unemployable for the rest of her life, he said.<\/p>\n

Moss has been \u201cphysically and emotionally sick\u201d since the start, and the \u201cemotions are sincere \u2013 she regrets everything,\u201d Jaye said.<\/p>\n

Moss was visibly shaking throughout the hearing.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s had a rough, traumatic life,\u201d though it does not excuse her actions, Jaye said.<\/p>\n

In her statement, Moss said she was sorry and \u201cembarrassed and ashamed.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI just want to apologize to the city of Cortez employees and Cortez citizens,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Chief Judge Douglas Walker said \u201csentencing in these cases is really difficult.\u201d<\/p>\n

He acknowledged the harm done to the city of Cortez and its citizens, but noted Moss\u2019s otherwise clean record, save for a traffic violation.<\/p>\n

Moss is responsible for repaying at least $14,733.40 to the city of Cortez and $63,642 to Western Surety Co., the insurance company that covered the city\u2019s loss of the embezzled money, within 90 days, though she brought checks with the money owed to the sentencing hearing Thursday.<\/p>\n

The $14,000 owed to the city is \u201cnothing to sneeze at in these times,\u201d Walker said.<\/p>\n

He gave Moss 30 days in jail, finding that \u201csome jail time is appropriate,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cOddly enough, the Montezuma County jail is probably safer than City Market,\u201d Walker said. The county jail has only had one COVID-19 case, and the person was removed within a few hours of the test results, he said.<\/p>\n

But Moss chose to serve her time in the Weld County jail, where she has relocated, despite its higher number of COVID-19 cases.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have family and support there,\u201d Moss said. \u201cI don\u2019t have anything here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Walker said he would need documentation from the Weld County Sheriff\u2019s Office confirming Moss can serve her sentence in the Weld County jail.<\/p>\n

If the documentation is acquired, Moss is set to report to the Weld County jail on Nov. 5. Otherwise, she will serve her sentence in the Montezuma County Detention Center.<\/p>\n

ehayes@the-journal.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

apologizes to city of Cortez employees, residents<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":50846,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[318,13,28,167],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-50845","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-cortez-municipal-government","tag-frontpage-lead","tag-headlines","tag-local-news-lead"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50845","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50845"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50845\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":87839,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50845\/revisions\/87839"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/50846"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50845"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50845"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50845"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=50845"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}