First District Court Judge Fred Gibler this morning sentenced Sandra Kay Martinson to 90 days in the Kootenai County Jail and ordered her to make restitution for her embezzling of over $100,000 from Kootenai County during her employment as Deputy Kootenai County Clerk. She will be required to pay $1,000 per month until she has made restitution of $49,075 to Kootenai County and the Idaho Counties Risk Management Program (ICRMP).   In addition, she will serve 5 years supervised probation.

Bonner County prosecuting attorney Louis Marshall had asked the judge to sentence Martinson to 120 days in the county jail.  Martinson could have been sentenced to 4 years fixed state prison time and up to an additional 6 years indeterminate state prison time.

In sentencing Martinson, Judge Gibler noted that while she had no criminal record, her embezzlement covering a period of 10 years had been a systematic scheme and not a single impulsive act. He also observed it was a “significant betrayal of public trust.” Judge Gibler declined to withhold judgement, saying that because Martinson had been a public employee, he intended the sentence to send a message to others.

Martinson, who will begin serving her jail sentence this Thursday, is afflicted with multiple sclerosis and will be allowed to leave jail to receive necessary treatments.

At the pretrial conference today for Sandra Kay Martinson, her attorney Frederick Loats told First District Judge Fred Gibler that he and Bonner County Prosecutor Louis Marshall had reached a tentative plea agreement.  Martinson would agree to plead guilty to one count of grand theft in return for a suspended prison sentence (local incarceration optional with the judge), supervised probation,  and restitution for an amount to be determined.

Judge Gibler directed that a pre-sentence report be prepared and delivered to him.  Martinson will be sentenced at 10:00 a.m. on October 24, 2011.  The judge is under no obligation to accept all or any of the plea agreement.  At sentencing, if Judge Gibler rejects the plea agreement, Martinson would be allowed to withdraw her guilty plea and request the jury trial be rescheduled. (more…)

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On July 29, 2016, Kootenai County Clerk Jim Brannon recommended that the Kootenai County Board of Commissioners authorize and fund a forensic audit of the Fair Board’s financial records.  His recommendation was that the audit should be done after this year’s North Idaho Fair has concluded.

His recommendation was both reasonable and appropriate given the findings reported in the Kootenai County Internal Audit Final Report, June & July, 2016, concerning the North Idaho Fair processes.  OpenCdA endorses that recommendation wholeheartedly. (more…)

Yesterday’s local skewspaper article headlined Athol audit results revealed included this statement:  “[Assistant US Attorney Traci] Whelan said the federal government got involved in the case because Hansen was a public employee in a position of public trust.”

Fine.  That was certainly an acceptable reason.

But from 1985 until she retired in 2010, Sandra Kay Martinson was a public employee in a position of public trust as Kootenai County Chief Deputy Clerk and Auditing Supervisor embezzling public money in the office of former Kootenai County Clerk Dan English.  Yet when English’s replacement Cliff Hayes requested assistance from the FBI, his request was first approved and then just as quickly withdrawn.  According to the FBI’s response to our inquiry through Congressman Raul Labrador, Hayes’ request (not ours as AD Perkins incorrectly stated in his letter) was turned down by AUSA Whelan’s boss, the office of the US Attorney for the District of Idaho Wendy J. Olson.  Martinson was convicted in state court and sentenced to 90 days in the county jail, however she was released from jail before she completed that sentence.

So if the reason for the feds getting involved in Hansen’s investigation was because she was a public employee in a position of public trust, then why did the US Attorney for the District of Idaho tell the FBI to back off on Martinson?

Officials of local governments as well as school and community college districts have a  duty to act in the best interests of their constituents.  Too many officials are either unintentionally unaware or intentionally disregarding that duty and the penalties that can be imposed if they fail to diligently and honestly perform them.    When those officials fail to diligently and impartially perform their oversight duties, dishonest insiders (usually trusted and long-time employees) exploit those failures for personal gain.

We have seen that in Kootenai County with the convictions of former Kootenai County Chief Deputy Clerk and Auditing Supervisor Sandra Martinson and former Coeur d’Alene City Finance Department Payroll Coordinator Sheryl Carroll.  Recently former Athol City Clerk Sally Hansen has been charged in federal court with wire fraud and stealing approximately $400,000 from the city during her five years of employment.

But Idaho isn’t the only place where lax oversight by supervisors can lead to embezzlement and grand theft.  In Pasadena, California,  the Los Angeles Times is reporting that Pastor Danny Wooten has been accused of embezzling over $5 million during the ten years he was working as a management analyst for the city of Pasadena.  The January 15, 2015, Times article is headlined Pasadena embarrassed by charges that employee embezzled $5 million.

If you carefully read the Times article, you are going to see some of the same things we heard in the Martinson and Carroll cases. (more…)

In its 2014 session, the Idaho Legislature took the smallest baby steps it could when it passed S 1369.  The bill was signed into law by the Governor on March 26, 2014, and went into effect on July 1, 2014.  It was not passed to encourage the systematic investigation and prosecution of corrupt public officials in Idaho.  It was passed to make Idaho’s county prosecuting attorneys more comfortable and politically safe.

This is made clear in the bill’s statement of purpose which reads, “This bill eliminates a conflict of interest that currently exists for county prosecutors.  County prosecutors represent county elected officials in their elected capacity, and also have a responsibility to deal with misconduct by those same county elected officials when they are acting in their official capacity.  This bill moves the misconduct authority to the Attorney General.”

The Idaho Attorney General’s homepage has a left-column button labeled “Public Corruption.”  Mouseclicking on that button will offer the reader links to two other webpages.  One of them is entitled, “Explanation of Duties and Responsibilities,” and the other is entitled, “Public Corruption Complaint Form.”

Reading the “Explanation of Duties and Responsibilities” page confirms that this new section of law “…authorizes the Attorney General to conduct ‘a preliminary investigation of any allegation of a violation of state law, criminal or civil, against a county officer occupying an elective office for violation of state law in his official capacity.’ ”

To make this crystal clear, the new law authorizes the Attorney General to conduct a preliminary investigation of allegations of misconduct only against  (1) County Commissioners; (2) County Prosecuting Attorney; (3) County Sheriff; (4) County Clerk; (5) County Assessor; (6) County Treasurer, and (7) County Coroner.

So in Kootenai County, for example, the new section of law authorizes the AG to investigate nine people, no more.   No one else unless the county prosecuting attorney invites the AG to come in.  (more…)