FROM STAFF REPORTS
CHARLEVOIX -- Former state conservation officer Kevin Lockman will be sentenced for receiving and concealing stolen property next week.
Lockman, 35, of Boyne City, will appear Nov. 7 before 33rd Circuit Court Judge Richard Pajtas in Charlevoix. He pleaded guilty to receiving and concealing stolen property between $200 and $1,000, a misdemeanor.
Lockman, a former Michigan Department of Natural Resources conservation officer, initially was charged with receiving and concealing stolen property in excess of $20,000, a 10-year felony. His crime is connected to those of his wife, Karla Lockman, who is in state prison after her conviction for embezzling $1.38 million between January and May 2005 from now-defunct Northern Preferred Title Company in Charlevoix County.
Kevin Lockman used more than $33,000 of the stolen funds to pay for his wife's lawyer. Karla Lockman told her husband the money was from an early inheritance, but police told the Lockmans they knew the money was stolen from her employer before he spent some of it on an attorney, police records show.
Kevin Lockman agreed to pay $30,000 in restitution and give up his law enforcement license as part of the plea agreement, said Charles Koop, special prosecutor from Antrim County.
That means he may not be able to regain his DNR job, despite prior efforts in arbitration, officials said.
