10/26/2017
Missouri State Auditor Nicole Galloway released an audit of the Cooper County clerk that details actions taken by former clerk, Darryl Kempf, to misappropriate county funds to purchase a leased vehicle. The issues were brought to the attention of auditors during a routine audit of Cooper County.
"There must be no tolerance for public officials who use their office for personal gain," Auditor Galloway said. "While the details of this report are disappointing, I am pleased our audit work contributed to a thorough investigation that resulted in the former Cooper County clerk being held accountable for his actions."
In 2014, the county clerk leased a brand new Toyota Tundra pickup truck in the name of the county, despite the fact that the county owned an SUV available for the clerk's use and a previous audit of Cooper County questioned the cost effectiveness of leasing vehicles. The clerk admitted to only using the vehicle for business purposes about 30 percent of the time.
In 2016, after the county had already paid $13,781 in lease payments and property taxes to the leasing company, the clerk terminated the lease early and used a combination of county and personal funds to purchase the truck. The clerk titled the truck in the county's name, but then prepared paperwork to gift the truck to himself. Eight days after titling the truck in Cooper County, he traveled to a different county and transferred ownership to himself. Since he had gifted the vehicle to himself, he evaded paying $2,335 in state and local taxes.
After being questioned by the Missouri State Highway Patrol, the clerk processed a title correction and paid the sales tax. He then attempted to use county funds to make about $23,500 in additional payments to the leasing company, even though the lease had already been paid off. The county clerk indicated he was attempting to convert the truck back to a county-owned vehicle and obtain a refund of the monies he had paid to purchase the vehicle.
The audit also questioned the use of the county's Election Services Fund to purchase and maintain vehicles that primarily personally benefitted the county clerk. Legally, the fund should be used for training programs and supplies or equipment to improve the conduct of elections but the audit found that since the fund was established approximately 18 years ago only 4 percent of spending could be directly associated with such activities.
At the end of September, the County Clerk pled guilty to stealing. As a part of a plea agreement he was sentenced to six months in the Cooper County jail, however, the sentence was suspended and he was placed on two years of unsupervised probation. As a condition of probation, he was required to pay restitution to Cooper County and the Missouri Department of Revenue. Also, as part of the plea agreement, he resigned from office.
A complete copy of the audit report is available http://auditor.mo.gov/Repository/Press/2017122729671.pdfhere.
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