The former Washington state NAACP activist outed as a white woman after passing herself off as an African-American is now facing charges of welfare fraud.
Rachel Dolezal, the former head of the civil rights group in Spokane, was charged on Tuesday with theft by welfare fraud and false identity verification in applying for public assistance, NBC affiliate KHQ-TV reports.
According to court documents cited by the network, the 40-year-old illegally received $8,747 in government food assistance and another $100 in childcare assistance between 2015 and 2017.
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Investigators first began looking into Dolezal’s finances in March 2017 when she published a controversial book detailing what she calls her “trans-racial” identity, a topic that divided the black community and civil rights activists at the time, KHQ-TV reports.
Despite usually reporting a monthly income of less than $500, Dolezal reportedly deposited around $84,000 into her bank account during the same period without disclosing it to the Department of Social and Health Services. The money came from sales and speaking engagements from her memoir “In Full Color,” according to the case file.
In early 2017 it was reported that Dolezal was struggling to pay bills, jobless and facing homelessness after being dismissed from the NAACP and her position as an adjunct professor of African studies at Eastern Washington University.
After years of civil rights activism, Dolezal’s parents told reporters that she had merely posed as being African-American. Dolezal, who legally changed her name to Nkechi Diallo in 2016, has said she began to change her perspective and present herself differently after her parents adopted four black children.
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