Lean Granger, the wife of Dartmouth professor Richard Granger, was convicted Wednesday of stealing approximately $320,000 from a church in California, where the couple previously resided. She will serve six years in California state prison and must pay $333,133 in restitution, according to a press release from the Orange County District Attorney’s office.
Lean Granger pled guilty to seven felony counts of forgery, a felony count of grand theft and a sentencing enhancement for property damage over $150,000, according to the District Attorney’s office.
Lean Granger was accused of forging the signatures of Newport Harbor Lutheran church board members on more than 170 checks , which were made out to her and to Caspian Scientific, LLC., a business she and her husband started, according to the press release. The company, currently registered in New Hampshire in her husband’s name, provides “consulting services in the area of interdisciplinary neuroscience,” according to documents filed with the state, and is “not in good standing,” according to the New Hampshire company registry. Lean Granger was treasurer and bookkeeper of the church from October 2002 through February 2006, according to the press release.
Hanover Police arrested Granger on March 27 and extradited her to California in April, where she was tried by the Orange County Superior Court.
Richard Granger, the former director of Dartmouth’s Neukom Insitute for Computational Science, stepped down as director for “personal reasons” following the announcement of his wife’s arrest, but continues to direct the College’s Brain Imaging Laboratory and retains his position as a psychological and brain sciences professor. Associate Dean of the Faculty Lindsay Whaley, a linguistics and cognitive science professor, is directing the Neukom Institute in the interim.
Richard Granger served as a professor at the University of California Irvine and director of UC Irvine’s Brain Engineering Laboratory before coming to Dartmouth in July 2006.
The Orange County District Attorney’s Office prosecutor in the case, Yvette Patko, refused in past interviews to comment on whether Richard Granger is under investigation, citing office policy.
Richard Granger and a spokesmen from the Orange County District Attorney’s office could not be reached for comment. A spokesman from Dartmouth’s Office of Public Affairs declined to comment.
