Two charged with skimming $350,000 from Philly homeless services organization

Two former executives of SELF Inc., a homeless services organization, have been indicted on charges of  diverting about $350,000 for their own use.

The U.S. attorney’s office has charged Erica Brown and Nathaniel  Robinson with making purchases for years that Assistant U.S. Attorney Karen Grigsby called “lavish and personal.”

The expenses included travel to the Caribbean and Disney World, as well as groceries, clothing, and five pairs of boots Brown charged to her corporate American Express Card.

SELF gets approximately $1 million a year in federal funds, Grigsby said. A respected nonprofit, SELF was founded by a reformed drug dealer, Sylvester Outley, in the late 1980s. It operates a number of emergency shelters and drug-treatment programs.

The attorneys for the two defendants did not immediately return calls requesting comment.