A colossal waste

Tuesday night the JP’s heard from Attorney James Lane regarding his investigation into the misuse of public funds by members of the sheriff’s office. I was there and heard this report, I’d have to say that this investigation by Lane was a colossal waste of taxpayer’s money.

The Quorum Court F&A Committee commissioned Lane back in November on recommendation of H.G. Foster to determine exactly how much money was owed to the county and who was going to have to repay the funds. But upon completion of Lane's investigation the county knows very little more than it did before.

Lane concluded that Sheriff Montgomery still owes $3,561 for books, tuition, and other personal expenditures he made. The report also shows an amount of $12,400 for payroll that was paid to Tammy Weaver while she was unable to work because of an illness in her family, $9,747 of this amount is owed by Weaver.

Lane and CPA David Little say the sheriff’s office was able to “find” documentation for most of the reported $18,762 of poorly documented credit card purchases. It was reported that $2,133 of that amount was determined to be personal charges and is included in the bottom line. A total of $17,359 is all that is said to be owed by members of the sheriff’s office with $19,917 for cell phone charges and $13,785 in questionable spending at Wal-Mart and Sam’s Club left outstanding.

What about the egregious incidents of theft and fraud where everything from Pampers to Liquor was purchased with the county’s money? Well that’s in the $13,785 left outstanding. Lane told the court that it would be an expensive and nearly impossible task to nail down the perpetrators of these expenses and recommends the court to seek policy measures to prevent reoccurrences.

I don’t know about you but we seen this one coming. After all the sheriff was allowed to use county funds to pay for admittedly personal expenses without any penalty, why shouldn’t his employees get the same luxury? Just another sad commentary of our pathetic system of justice.

Excerpts from a recent article in the Arkansas Democrat Gazette concerning the egregious incidents of theft and fraud at the Faulkner County Sheriff’s Office portray me as an angry watchdog of the department. I’d have to say that this reporter hit the nail right on the head with that portrayal. Truth be told there are quite a lot of citizens angered by this and other issues that surround Sheriff Montgomery’s tenure as sheriff.

One of those individuals recently posted comments on this site stating they would be glad to send everyone a copy of the investigation that has been burned to a CD. Desmond Walls Allen’s home was burglarized in April 1998 and Allen says the Sheriff's Office wouldn't investigate the crime. A charge of residential burglary of more than $10,000 in property and nothing was being done about it. Allen found out the name of two of the perpetrators and tried to get this information to the sheriff’s office but they wouldn’t return phone calls much less pursue with an investigation.

This is all too familiar to us having experienced the same sort of inexcusable lack of action against crime in our own neighborhood. It has become as commonplace as a trip to the supermarket for victims of crime to be further victimized by our local system of justice. Our neighbor and co-author of this site has a saying, “If you want to commit a crime do it in Faulkner County and you’ll get away with it”.

With our state prisons and county jails overcrowded and allegations of illegalities in several different police agencies across the state, is it really any wonder that crime is on the increase in Arkansas bucking the national trend. A 2004 FBI report shows a 1.2 % drop in violent crime nationally from last year while here in Arkansas violent crime rose 10.8% (9.3% per 100,000). Broken down further Arkansas showed a 28.0% increase in forcible rape, 6.5% increase in robbery, and 9.8% increase in aggravated assault. Property crimes in Arkansas also increased by 11.5% with the biggest jump of 20.3% for burglaries.

Now who is to blame for the lack of criminal charges in the admitted misuse of county monies? Is it Special Prosecutor Stephen Tabor of Sebastian County for not finding probable cause? Is it Judge Charles E. Clawson Jr. for setting a very narrow focus into the spending issues? Or could it be the Quorum Court for voting for a less aggressive investigation and not turning this over to the State Police from the start? It is our belief that it is a combination of all three events that led to Montgomery and staff getting away with, as Tabor put it, egregious incidents of theft and fraud.

Allen says after reading the investigation file a grand jury should have been convened to seek charges against the abuse of county tax dollars. You can get a copy by emailing your name and address to desmond@ipa.net.

How to prevent thefts like these in the future is the next topic that will likely be addressed by the Quorum Court. A topic that was touched on by some members of the court Tuesday night as well as addressed by Lane in his recommendations. Lane recommended that the sheriff's office limit it’s number of credit cards to only a few and having a supervisor go over the receipts at the time of purchase to ensure legitimacy of the items purchased. Lane suggested termination of employment be the punishment for a violation. However JP Marvin Kelley said “we are here to set policy, not to issue writs of control”. Somehow I think Kelley misses the point.

What we need are more ‘writs of control’ and better policies in order to prevent theft. We need to cancel ALL the credit cards and only buy from stores that will use P.Os. In a county jail system this size that can pretty much guarantee thousands of dollars in purchases a year we should dictate how these purchases are made. There should be no reason why we should ever pay retail price for any food or supply purchases.

But the most important need we must demand from our elected officials is accountability. Our county tax dollars were used for clearly personal items and no one was fired, no one will have to repay over $13,000 in questionable spending, and with no consequences for this theft there is no deterrent for repeat offenses. Isn’t it time we said enough is enough? Isn’t it time we have a new and better administration at the sheriff’s office?