Rachel Dolezal pleads not guilty to welfare fraud
Rachel Dolezal, the woman formerly accused of NAACP-ing while white, pleaded not guilty to welfare fraud in Washington State this week, according to news organizations.
Dolezal, now known as Nkechi Diallo, made a brief appearance in Spokane County Superior Court on Wednesday in the case.
The charges of welfare fraud and false verification for benefits are connected to income Diallo received from publication of her memoir, “In Full Color,” and from other sources while receiving welfare benefits, according to prosecutors.
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Dolezal was freed on her own recognizance and a trial date was set for Sept. 10.
Dolezal made headlines back in 2015 when, after years of presenting herself as a Black woman at Howard University, as a community leader and as head of the Spokane NAACP, it was revealed that she was born to white parents and raised in rural Montana.
Diallo’s phony persona was exposed after her parents told reporters that their daughter was not Black. Along with resigning her NAACP post, she also lost posts as a freelance columnist for a weekly newspaper and as an educator teaching African studies at Eastern Washington University, according to the AP.
Netflix recently aired a documentary called The Rachel Divide.
