Former Fresno Arts Council Manager Admits Stealing $1.8 Million for Casinos, Vacations

Suliana Caldwell spent more than three years funneling $1.8 million out of the Fresno Arts Council, and the financial reports she submitted to her bosses and to city and county officials never revealed a penny missing. She altered them herself.

Caldwell, the organization's former operations manager, filed a federal wire fraud plea agreement in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California, admitting to the theft and agreeing to full restitution of the stolen funds. Court documents show she began the scheme in June 2022, wiring money directly from Arts Council bank accounts into her personal checking account and PayPal. She spent the proceeds at local casinos and on vacations. A formal guilty plea hearing is set for April 20.

The $1.8 million she acknowledged in the plea agreement exceeds the $1.5 million in Measure P funds that Fresno city officials initially disclosed when the scandal surfaced in early February. Measure P is the 30-year sales tax Fresno voters approved in 2018, with 12 percent of collections earmarked for the arts and administered by the Arts Council through competitive grants. Caldwell, who held the operations manager role for roughly four years, had routine access to those funds.

The day after the Arts Council reported the missing money to the city on Feb. 5, the city terminated its Measure P contract and seized control of remaining grant funds. City officials warned that artists who had already received award notices might face a reduction in their payments if the full amount could not be recovered. To avoid that outcome, the city announced plans to temporarily backfill shortfalls with general fund dollars from the Parks Department. A third tranche of Measure P arts grants totaling $6.6 million, which the Arts Council had requested in October despite failing to file required financial reports, was withheld entirely.

Caldwell confessed to the Fresno Police Department and the FBI on March 26. Under the plea deal, federal prosecutors plan to recommend three years of supervised release and full restitution rather than prison time, though Caldwell faces a statutory maximum of 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine if the sentencing judge declines that recommendation.

The scheme persisted for over three years in part because no mechanism existed to catch it. At a community meeting held at Tower District arts venue Dulce Upfront in February, City Manager Georgeanne White and Councilmember Miguel Arias fielded questions from more than 50 residents, many of them artists still waiting on grant disbursements. The mayor's office and City Council members said publicly they were "appalled by the lack of safeguards put in place by the Fresno Arts Council, which ultimately allowed this embezzlement to occur."

Longtime executive director Lilia Gonzales-Chavez, who had led the organization since 2011, retired following the scandal. Program manager Andrea Mele stepped in as interim executive director while the board launched a search for permanent leadership.

The restitution obligation required by the plea deal places $1.8 million squarely in Caldwell's name as a federal debt. What it does not resolve, on its own, is the structural failure at the center of the case: how a single employee moved that much money, over that many months, without a second signature, an independent audit flag, or a board alert ever being triggered.