A former legislative aide who worked in the Maryland Senate is facing charges that she used her position and access to a senator’s email account to award herself $20,000 in scholarship money.

The Office of the Maryland State Prosecutor on Wednesday announced charges of felony theft and unauthorized access to a computer system against Esther Dikongue.

The charging document against Dikongue does not name the lawmaker who employed her, but a March 2020 end-of-session report from Sen. Will Smith, a Montgomery County Democrat who chairs the powerful Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee, lists Dikongue as an aide.

Reached by phone, Smith called the situation “tremendously disappointing.”

“Once I became aware of the problem, I reported it to the state prosecutor,” who began an investigation, he said. “The charging documents you see online are the direct result of that investigation.”

Dikongue is represented by attorney Thomas Maronick.

“We have been in discussions with the State Prosecutor’s Office regarding this case and look forward to our day in court on what we believe will be a fair resolution of these matters,” Maronick said Wednesday.

According to the charging documents, Dikongue’s duties as a legislative aide included interacting with a committee that the senator had organized to review applications for Senatorial Scholarships and recommend winners.

Dikongue never applied for a Senatorial Scholarship but emailed the Maryland Higher Education Commission in July 2022 to say she had been awarded a scholarship, according to the documents.

Maryland state senators are provided a budget for these scholarships, which they can award to people in their district who plan to attend a Maryland college or an out-of-state school that offers a program not offered in the state. The Higher Education Commission distributes the money.

Dikongue emailed that she would receive $10,000 and confirmed the amount when commission staff double-checked the unusually high scholarship award, prosecutors wrote in the charging document. The senator typically awarded $500 to $1,500 at a time.

“Dikongue directed the Maryland funds fraudulently awarded to her [student financial aid] portal to be sent to a school in Washington, D.C. where she was enrolled in a Master’s program,” prosecutors wrote. Dikongue’s LinkedIn page says she is a master’s candidate at American University.

After Dikongue’s employment as a legislative aide ended, according to the documents, she secretly used the senator’s password to access his email account multiple times and email the Higher Education Commission that her scholarship had been renewed. She allegedly used the signature lines of two other legislative aides without their knowledge.

Dikongue had been granted access to the senator’s email account during her employment, though she was authorized to respond to emails only if she included her signature line, according to the charging documents.