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HPI Analysis: Despite headlines, local governments are relatively clean
Thursday, June 13, 2013 8:43 AM
This article was originally published in the June 6, 2013 edition of Howey Politics Indiana.

By BRIAN A. HOWEY
    
INDIANAPOLIS – Misty Buck was a deputy clerk in the Muncie clerk’s office and failed to deposit $11,325.50.
    
Brittany Cohee of the Benton Township trustee’s office in Monroe County made $2,370 overpayments of salary.
    
Chandler Clerk-Treasurer Timothy D. Osha rolled up $143,010.36 in personal expenses on credit cards, personal property use, penalties and interest and audit costs.
    
Bunker Hill Town Court Judge Melvin Smith didn’t make deposits of $37,052.50, including speeding tickets some of you might have incurred on U.S. 31 in Miami County.
    
Supt. Marion Chapman of Cannelton School Corporation rolled up $615,586.55 misappropriated compensation and benefits and improper handling of a trust fund principal.
    
Melody Buchanan, deputy clerk-treasurer of West Terre Haute, was responsible for $463,752.19 in missing collections.
    
Debbie Deitrich was a cafeteria employee at Logansport Memorial Hospital responsible for $60,403.24 in missing cafeteria receipts.
    
These public servants are part of a rogues gallery which in combination misappropriated $9,785,401 between 2009 and 2012, according to the office of the Indiana Attorney General. There is $9,017,490 in original balances for audit report cases still open. They are part of what is called the civil prosecution of public corruption that included 142 cases between 2009 and 2012 during the Zoeller administration.
    
Another 29 cases have been filed as of last week in 2013, pushing the total to more than $10 million. There have been 221 audit report cases, some of which did not result in civil litigation to recover funds. The amount still owed by defendants in currently open cases is $8.8 million, according to AG spokesman Bryan Corbin.

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