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Sunday, July 16, 2006

Ind. Courts - "Audit finds disorder in Payne court"

The Indianapolis Star's Richard D. Walton and Tim Evans have a story today on the draft results of an audit of the Marion County Juvenile Court and Detention Center under former Judge James W. Payne conducted by the State Board of Accounts. From the story:

Shoddy record-keeping, the issuing of blank checks for purchases and the apparent misuse of $2,317 for a party are among the findings of an audit of the Marion County Juvenile Court and Detention Center under former Judge James W. Payne.

The draft report, obtained by The Indianapolis Star, found controls and documentation so lacking at the troubled center that auditors said it was impossible to verify many expenditures.

The report also raised questions about the use of county-owned vehicles by court officials, but included few specifics.

The audit was requested by the Marion Superior Court executive committee after then-Court Administrator Mark Renner found irregularities following Payne's departure last year to head the state's Department of Child Services.

"There was a sense of surprise and, in some quarters, outrage that those controls, those protocols, did not exist," said Renner, who has since left county government. * * *

Superior Court Judge Jane Magnus-Stinson -- who along with judges Cale Bradford and Robyn Moberly sits on the executive committee -- was in her first week on the panel when she learned of what she calls the financial "mess."

"In my history in government, which extends 15 or 16 years, our traditional going away is a pitch-in and a cake," she said. "I don't believe the State Board of Accounts authorizes you to use the public's money to throw a party."

The report also said that a failure to produce vehicle logs left auditors unable to determine if the use of county-owned vehicles complied with county and IRS guidelines. Logs are required under state accounting guidelines.

"There was always that sense of concern: Is this being handled correctly?" Renner said. "But other than trusting (Payne), we didn't have any real oversight or any real way to ensure that proper procedures, protocols and ordinances were being followed."

The lack of significant oversight of juvenile services can be partly explained by tradition.

Historically, Marion County courts operated separately. Even after they were unified in 1996, some judges resisted scrutiny.

"You had always had a group of independently elected, very independent-minded judges running their own individual courts," Renner said. "Now they were being told you now no longer have that authority. It took a number of years. . . for judges to relinquish" their turf.

By most accounts, Payne never did. Superior Court Judge Barbara Collins recalled an encounter with the judge while trying to collect financial data for a court-sponsored project to examine the county's juvenile justice system.

Payne, she said, was not interested in helping with the project. While he eventually provided some records, they were not the ones Collins and consultants had requested.

"He didn't refuse," she said. "He just didn't do it." * * *

Collins said judges today, like all other public officials, must be accountable. "You can't just do things you want to because you are the boss," she said.

But Payne was for years the face of juvenile justice in Indiana. Renner said Payne's seniority and standing within the Republican Party made some reluctant to press him to yield part of his control.

The Star today also publishes a "My View" column by Payne, now director of the Indiana Department of Child Services, appointed by Governor Daniels when he took office in 2005. It begins:
The recent information about the Marion County Juvenile Court, while distressing, has clouded what I believe have been, over the past years, the many accomplishments of the men and women who have devoted their adult lives and in many cases whole careers to serving children in our community who come into the juvenile system. I would like to point out some of those accomplishments.
Finally in the Star today, this editorial, headed "Mismanaging juvenile justice," calling for more oversight.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on July 16, 2006 07:09 AM
Posted to Indiana Courts