For months serious criminal accusations have hung over the heads of elected Mendocino County’s Auditor Chamise Cubbison and former County Payroll Manager Paula June ‘P.J.’ Kennedy after District Attorney David Eyster filed felony charges of misappropriation of public funds 17 months ago.
There were public claims that vigilant County administrators led by CEO Darcie Antle had tipped law enforcement to the fact that Kennedy secretly drew about an $68,000 in pay over three years during the Covid pandemic by using a mysterious “470” county payroll code. Antle was credited with alerting the DA to an unauthorized pay scheme Cubbison and Kennedy allegedly had worked out.
After DA Eyster formally charged Cubbison, the County Board of Supervisors swiftly suspended Cubbison without pay and benefits, and publicly touted that it had acted to “protect” the county’s finances.
Those claims were shattered Monday in yet another dramatic turn in the Cubbison criminal case, however.
When the preliminary hearing resumed Monday after a month-long break, the court unexpectedly learned that the DA’s chief investigator last week had turned over “exculpatory” evidence.
It showed in fact the extra pay for Kennedy for three years had been routinely included in twice-monthly payroll reports that were automatically distributed to top county administrators, including Antle and her staff.
The specific information also had been sent to the County’s Human Resources Manager, who had earlier testified she didn’t even know what the 470 code was. The county code is one of dozens and typically used to label miscellaneous expenses.
The regular reports citing Kennedy’s extra pay also had been distributed for two years to former Auditor Lloyd Weer before he retired in 2021. Weer claimed during earlier testimony that he never authorized any extra pay for Kennedy while he was still in charge of the office, and that he was unaware she had been including it in her check.
The disclosure of the documents’ existence on Monday clearly displeased Superior Court Judge Ann Moorman.
Moorman called the documents “important” in the face of testimony that suggested secrecy surrounding the Kennedy extra pay was made in a covert manner.
“Willful ignorance will not be tolerated by this court,” declared Moorman.
Moorman said she would now have to look differently at the earlier testimonies of Weer and Cherie Johnson, the county’s Human Resources manager. Both had claimed to be unaware of the 470 code payments, as did Antle.
Moorman ordered the county’s IT department to produce copies of the regular reports that Weer, Antle, Johnson and other County officials regularly received, as well as “any member of the Board of Supervisors.”
The fact that earlier in the criminal proceedings significant time had been spent on thousands of missing county emails because of the collapse of an archival system also seemed to be on Moorman’s mind. The judge reminded participants that she had taken the extraordinary step of bringing in a special master to review for relevancy hundreds of emails that eventually were retrieved.
“Even with those steps, what was presented today was not discovered,” said Moorman.
Moorman paused, and then said again, “Willful ignorance will not be tolerated by this court.”
The hearing resumes at 10 a.m. today.
The outcome will determine if Cubbison and Kennedy will be ordered to stand trial, or whether Moorman will rule favorably on pending defense motions to dismiss the case.
Monday’s disclosure of the retrieved payroll reports dramatically shifted the focus of the preliminary hearing.
Until now, it has been a plodding examination of county payroll procedures and the extraordinary amount of time everyone agreed that Kennedy had put in processing a payroll for 1,200 county employees during the covid interlude.
The extra work came at a time when the Auditor’s Office was being buffeted by pandemic stresses, a faulty computer system, and board plans to forcibly merge the Auditor’s office with the Treasurer-Tax Collector, the second of the county’s two key finance offices to be led by an elected official.
CEO Antle was expected to resume her testimony when Monday’s preliminary hearing renewed, but instead Andrew Alvarado, Eyster’s chief investigator, was called by Cubbison defense attorney Chris Andrian to explain how prosecutors learned of the payroll reports.
Alvarado was followed by deputy County Counsel Brina Blanton who attempted to explain how her office had overlooked the reports. Blanton was followed by IT Manager/Deputy CEO Tony Rakes who attempted to explain why the reports didn’t surface during earlier searches.
On Moorman’s instructions, Rakes produced samples of the reports during an IT examination during the lunch hour.
Moorman directed that at today’s hearing she expects to have specific records submitted for six county officials including Antle, Weer, and Johnson, the Human Resources Manager.
Wow. Just…wow.
I sat through Monday’s hearing and yep. Just…yep.
Anyone lying to continue or aid in the Cubbison Plan needs to be fired, charged with a crime or recalled.
Let’s start with the recalls, the three BOS who remain on the board. They were part of the plan, especially Williams who has avoided public scrutiny on his role. He was MCGourty’s right hand man. Next, DA Dave needs to be recalled for his blatant role.
This is not the role of a CEO. Deception and lies and back room plans that are designed to harm a person’s reputation and integrity and possibly incarcerate them on false charges cannot be tolerated. Antle needs to fired, immediately.
As far as lying, we have had plenty of that. Some probably were forced to because of threats of losing their jobs.
Integrity, Andy Alvarado. It’s nice to see and is not shocking. He is an honorable person. Unlike Lt. Porter who took his marching orders from DA Dave whether it was right or wrong to obtain a certain outcome. Kendall needs to address him.
Moorman needs to put an end to this, or become complicit in this hoax.
I couldn’t agree more. In the least, the BoS need to terminate Darcie Antle for what appears to be either negligence or intentional dishonesty. Either way, how can anyone trust her to run the County?
RE: Next, DA Dave needs to be recalled for his blatant role.
—>. Naw, DA Dave needs to seek federal appointment with deviant Bove in DOJ, and resign his office with the County of Mendocino.
Mr. Eyster’s credentials are impeccable. Just imagine how many hapless defendants without deep pockets, have been hometown court railroaded bu DA Eyster, and his ilk, in return for reduced charges.
Former law enforcement bad actor cop Peter Hoyle could probably come up with more than a short list.
A Perry Mason moment?
Sure, Hamilton Burger invariably charged the wrong person, but he would never have been this sloppy.
Ms. Cubbison sure has a good lawyer. County Counsel? Not so much.
“Willful ignorance will not be tolerated by this court, declared Moorman.”
M.G.
The term Judge Moorman used concerning the antics in her court got my attention, so I looked it up.
Legally “Willful ignorance” is not a crime, from what I found.
However, the definition states, “Willful ignorance is when someone intentionally avoids learning facts that could lead to negative consequences. It can be a defense strategy in criminal law or a general behavior pattern that can lead to poor decision-making.”
And almost every heavy hitter at Low Gap is singing the same song… imagine that?
Have a nice day.
Laz
I think it’s worth adding one more item of testimony to the many in Mike G.’s fact-filled reporting: The report which was revealed yesterday to the court, titled “Pay Type Report” was delivered bi-weekly by email during the period of questioned payments to Ms. Kennedy. It was sent to an automatic suscription list that included a defined list of staff but never to Ms. Cubbison, although previous Auditor Lloyd Weer received the report every two weeks. Kennedy claims that Weer authorized the extra pay shown on the report which Weer denies.
Willful ignorance and confabulated memories is how we struggle to find comfort for very troubling things we’ve done.
Roses and Thorns:
Props to Tony Rakes and his IT department’s business analyst who came up with this new evidence without being asked after Rakes first testified in January. Rakes appears to be straightforward and honest, although he could be a bit more helpful in explaining IT terminology. I may know what a “permission” is in the context of network data access but clearly most folks involved in the case do not. Rakes’s testimony would have been much more clear if he’d made that and other points more clear.
Boos to the County Counsel’s approach to responding to public records requests (and subpoenas.). From the testimony the County just pulls words out of the request and directs staff to mindlessly search for just that phrase rather than talking to actual human beings to find out what they mean in the real world. So here, if I ask for “management payroll reports” someone types in that whole phrase and runs a search.. If there are “payroll reports” or “management reports” (that in fact contain relevant information) they are missed. Or if a email has a subject line like “SSRS report” but contains an attachment that is an auto-generated payroll report, that won’t show up either. Let alone that by not asking folks with knowledge whether there are documents/emails that contain information on payroll the County can miss huge swaths of relevant information. Here, if the County Counsel had done its job and asked folks in the Auditor’s office, Human Resources or IT “What kind of reports do we have on payroll?” all of this information would have come to light long ago.
Can you imagine the BOS today having a discussion about Code of Ethics. Well, they did.
Let’s remove Cline and Norvell from this since they had no part of the Cubbison Plan.
Here’s an idea Mulheren, Williams and Haschak, don’t be involved in a conspiracy with the CEO Antle and DA Dave against another elected official.
To all involved, don’t lie, even if means saving your job.
Think about this, after Mike Gienella great reporting of this case, the one conclusion we can come to, there was no Code of Ethics.
This whole case just proves how dishonest our county officials are, and if they had a conscious, anyone involved in the lies should resign.
INTEGRITY MEANS SOMETHING!
“Willful ignorance”?
Characteristic double-talk and obfuscation aside, sounds a lot like willful collusion to support a CYA hatchet job in this situation.
DA Dave, who started this mess, is an elected official too. Maybe he should be summarily fired.
Heads need to roll here.