A man sentenced to more than eight years in prison for conning 92 people out of their life savings and retirement accounts in Hayfield has pleaded guilty to swindling $215,000 from a Waltham church.

Dale Eugene Schlichting, 50, who is serving his sentence at Federal Prison Camp in Yankton, S.D., entered his plea in Mower County Court Friday morning, changing his plea from a not guilty plea entered the day before.

Schlichting was charged —with felony theft by swindle.

According to court records, on May 24, 2006, a sergeant with the Mower County Sheriff’s Office received a theft report from Cynthia Stoelk Harty of St. Michael’s Lutheran Church in Waltham regarding the defendant, who served as church president from January 2000 through spring 2006. He also doubled as endowment fund treasurer for a period of time.

Court records state the following:

That church staff had had trouble deciphering records because they were under Schlichting’s control for so many years; he had unrestricted access to financial accounts and records. Fund reports that had been presented to church officials did not match the actual account statements.

The sergeant observed checks written to the St. Michael’s Lutheran Church Brotherhood/Thrivent Investment account to World Vision Financial, a “get rich quick” business the defendant had created as a partnership to sell annuities, investments and bonds. World Vision went “belly up,” but in an attempt to save it, Schlichting used the church’s funds.

Checks were found written on the endowment account to World Vision in amounts ranging from $15,000 to $75,000. Annual reports from 2000 to 2005 showed two $75,000 CDs on which the endowment fund was supposed to be drawing interest; neither actual existed.

Court records also show church president Jennifer Chose said she believed the church invested $75,000 into the fund around 1992 for mission assistance. Unbeknownst at the time, the defendant had been investing monies into World Vision.

The total loss attributed to Schlichting is $215,000.

Schlichting’s court-appointed attorney, Dan Donnelly, said his sentence will run concurrent with the term he is serving now, and he will receive credit for time served. The maximum sentence for theft by swindle is 10 years in prison and/or a $20,000 fine.

Schlichting has returned to Yankton, where he will remain until his sentencing in Mower County Court Dec. 18 under Judge Fred Wellmann.

In June 2007, Schlichting was sentenced to 97 months in prison, followed by three years supervised release, for defrauding clients at his DSI Agency in Hayfield from 1999 through 2006 by selling them insurance and investment products. He set up two shell companies and routed investment checks through them without informing the investors.

U.S. District Judge Paul Magnuson also ordered Schlichting to pay nearly $3 million in restitution, but told victims there was little chance they’d ever see it.

At the time, Magnuson imposed what he called “the longest incarceration I have ever given to a so-called white-collar criminal. And I don’t do that lightly.

“You took an entire town, and it was an awful thing to do,” he told Schlichting during his sentencing in federal court. “It takes the heart right out of the town.”