Report No. 2007-66
October 2007

Complete Audit Report

An audit was conducted by our office of the Thirteenth Judicial Circuit, city of Fulton, Missouri Municipal Division.

The city of Fulton Municipal Division is within the Thirteenth Judicial Circuit, which consists of Boone and Callaway counties. The Honorable Gene Hamilton serves as Presiding Judge.

The current Court Clerk does not reconcile the composition of the receipt slips to the composition of the bank deposits. Checks and money orders are not restrictively endorsed and bank reconciliations are not prepared for the municipal division's bank account. In addition, the duties of receiving, recording, depositing, and disbursing monies collected by the court, as well as reconciling the municipal division's account, are not adequately segregated.

Fines, court costs, and fees are not being disbursed in accordance with state law. These fees have been allowed to accumulate in the court's account since January 2007. As of July 2007, a total of $36,890 remained in the account that should be paid to either the city or to the state as required. In addition, the Court Clerk does not file a monthly report with the city of all cases heard in court and the related fines and court costs collected.

A comprehensive control ledger showing the total amounts owed by defendants to the municipal division is not maintained, and the current Court Clerk does not monitor or review the open cases to follow up on uncollected amounts. In addition, closed case files are not available for review and the court's computer system maintains information for all cases processed by the court and all financial activities of the court; however, court data is not backed up to prevent loss of information. Also, the Municipal Division and the Police Department do not adequately account for the numerical sequence and ultimate disposition of traffic tickets.

The Court Clerk does not ensure all overtime parking tickets issued are received from the Meter Enforcement Officer with the ticket log. Monies received from overtime parking tickets are not deposited intact and in a timely manner, and the overtime parking collections are not kept in a secure location until the time of deposit. Payments of overtime parking tickets are not posted to the parking ticket log in a timely manner.

Complete Audit Report