Auto clerk admits selling fake IDs
A former clerk in the Erie County Auto Bureau pleaded guilty Thursday to charges that she sold fake IDs to teenagers.
Latasha Colbert, 24, faces six months in jail on five counts of third-degree bribe-receiving, all felonies. State Supreme Court Justice M. William Boller told Colbert she also faces five years’ probation when she is sentenced Nov. 14.
A tearful Colbert declined to comment afterward.
Prosecutor Justice T. Wallens said Colbert, who had been a part-time clerk at the Auto Bureau’s Broadway office for six years, pleaded guilty to taking bribes from teens between December 2006 and this January, when she was fired.
Colbert was arrested Jan. 11 after agreeing to provide an undercover female police officer an altered driver’s license for a $100 bribe. She allegedly changed the birth date on that woman’s driver’s license from 1989 to 1986.
Her arrest and plea were the result of an investigation by Erie County Clerk Kathleen C. Hochul and State Motor Vehicles Commissioner David J. Swarts. The probe was sparked by a tip.
Colbert reportedly took $50 bribes from a 14-year-old runaway, a 19-year-old girl linked to a local escort service, and underaged teens seeking work in strip clubs and casinos.
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