OAKLAND — A former Fremont city manager — who drew the ire of prosecutors last year for embarking on an Italian cooking trip while facing felony fraud charges here — was sentenced Thursday to jail time and a six-figure restitution bill.
Mark Danaj, 54, was told to report to Santa Rita Jail on June 4 to serve a 90-day jail sentence after having pled guilty last month to obtaining money under false pretenses, a felony. He also was ordered to pay nearly $317,000 to the city of Fremont, largely to reimburse the city for a severance check he received while leaving his job in 2021 under a thick legal cloud.
Danaj did not speak during the brief hearing before Alameda County Judge Kimberly Colwell, who also forbid him from ever holding public office again. She offered few remarks from the bench while imposing the sentence — saying only that the law “applies to us all.”
Authorities alleged that from December 2019 to March 2021, Danaj illegally used his city credit card to pay for thousands of dollars in personal expenses, including travel, medical services, food delivery and Apple products.
Former District Attorney Nancy O’Malley initially filed embezzlement and fraud charges against him in March 2022. Yet little happened in his case until spring 2023, when prosecutors reacted with incredulity at learning that Danaj had moved to Texas, enrolled in an $80,000 cooking program at the Culinary Institute of America and flown to Europe for a 15-week course at the Castello di Ugento, a centuries-old castle that’s now home to a five-star hotel.
“Defendant is in Italy?!” wrote prosecutor Alexandra Grayner in a May 2023 court filing. She ripped the “luxurious” Italian getaway as nothing more than “a pretextual excuse to gallivant around Europe while he awaits trial.”
Grayler later filed a third felony fraud charge against Danaj, alleging that he fraudulently concealed his misuse of a city-issued credit card to land that six-figure severance check while on his way out of the city.
On Friday, Grayner said that the result brings “accountability” for Danaj’s actions, as well as “closure” for Fremont’s residents. In particular, she expressed satisfaction that Danaj would be repaying the severance check.
“Once we looked deeper into this case, it was clear that Mr. Danaj had defrauded the city in order to obtain the severance, which he did by concealing his prior misconduct and charging personal expenses to a city credit card,” said Grayner, adding that “no one had investigated the severance payment” before Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price put her on the case.
After the hearing, Danaj’s attorney, Dan O’Malley, said the former city manager took the plea deal to avoid heading to trial and the possibility of a three-year prison sentence, if convicted.
“I’m 100% confident that he never had any intention to defraud the city of Fremont,” O’Malley said. “He took responsibility from day one to using credit cards for unauthorized use.”
At issue now is how quickly Danaj will pay back the nearly $317,000 owed to Fremont — particularly since Danaj could see his two-year probation sentence cut in half if he pays the entire bill within a year.
On Thursday, O’Malley cast doubt on that ever happening — framing his client as an “indigent” college student. The former city manager remains enrolled at the private culinary college, which bills itself as the “standard for excellence in professional culinary education,” according to its website.
“Just like you and me, I don’t think there’s any possibility of him coming up with $300,000 this year,” O’Malley said.