By Dan Horn
The Cincinnati Enquirer

A Cincinnati man accused of taking more than $1 million from a charity tried to withdraw his guilty plea Thursday, claiming that his wife was the real mastermind.

Samuel Ashley Jr., founder of the Ohio Community Emergency Food Center, told a federal judge that prosecutors tricked him into pleading guilty to mail fraud and tax evasion charges.

He said he was innocent and blamed his wife, Tina M. Swain, for defrauding the food center. "I was forced into this," Ashley said Thursday.

Federal authorities, however, said letters that Ashley wrote to his wife suggest that he intended all along to blame her for the fraud. Authorities said he waited to make the accusation until after Swain admitted her involvement in the scheme and was sentenced in January to six months in prison.

Both Ashley and Swain were arrested last year on charges of diverting money from the food center to bankroll a "lavish lifestyle" that included travel and gambling.

Prosecutors said Ashley, 43, used a fake name - Steve Adkins - because he was wanted in another fraud investigation in Dayton, Ohio.

Investigators from the FBI and the Internal Revenue Service found that Ashley took more than $1 million.

U.S. District Judge Susan Dlott said she would review the case and rule on whether Ashley could withdraw his plea. But the judge made it clear that she did not expect to allow Ashley to change his plea.

E-mail dhorn@enquirer.com