Joseph P. Waldholtz, a former Republican strategist already on parole for embezzling nearly $4 million from his former father-in-law, was sentenced yesterday to three to 15 years in prison for forging insurance and Veterans Affairs checks from his stepmother and his late father.

	Joseph Waldholtz during a January 2003 court appearance. (Joyce Mendelsohn, Post-Gazette)

After a nonjury trial before Common Pleas Judge Jeffrey A. Manning, Waldholtz was found guilty Nov. 10 of three counts of theft and receiving stolen property, and four of 23 counts of forgery.

Waldholtz, 41, of Shadyside, was sentenced only on the three counts of theft, said his defense attorney, Joseph A. Paletta.

Manning sentenced Waldholtz to three consecutive terms of one to five years in state prison.

Manning found Waldholtz not guilty of 19 counts of forgery in connection with his admission that he had signed his father's name on checks to pay bills for his father's business.

In a separate, nonjury proceeding before the sentencing, Manning found Waldholtz not guilty of insurance fraud in connection with a claim against jewelry owned by his stepmother.

In November 1996, Waldholtz was sentenced to federal prison for election, tax and bank fraud. He was released in early 1999. He had been convicted in U.S. District Court of embezzling almost $4 million from the father of his wife, former U.S. Rep. Enid Greene, R-Utah, and putting much of it into her 1994 campaign for Congress.

After Waldholtz disappeared for several days in 1995, Greene filed for divorce. She also dropped her re-election bid.

Waldholtz, who had been a Pennsylvania GOP strategist, also was accused of pilfering at least $388,000 from the estate of his grandmother, Rebecca Levenson, of Pittsburgh, putting her in financial straits until her death in April 1997.