State auditor jumps into Ozark Fire fraud case

Stacey Scrivener, former office manager for the Fire District, faces one count of felony stealing after she allegedly made personal charges worth more than $21,000 to a department credit card.

Scrivener’s preliminary hearing in Christian County Circuit Court is scheduled for Jan. 6, but Christian County Prosecuting Attorney Ron Cleek anticipates that the hearing will be postponed.

That’s because Cleek requested, and will receive, a certified fraud examination from the state auditor’s office into the district’s financial records. The auditor’s office began the work Nov. 22; results were not available at press time.

The process is only a partial audit; Cleek said he couldn’t get a full audit from the state because of the cost. The cost of a state audit can vary based on the number of work hours required by the auditor’s office.

“They don’t have the funds to pay for a full audit,” Cleek said. “The governor’s office has told me they can’t (pay for it). I understand everybody’s position, but it looks like what we’re headed for is a petition audit. If that happens, (the auditor’s office) said they’ll put it at the top of the heap so they can get it done as quickly as possible.”

A petition audit, according to the state auditor’s Web site, requires signatures of a certain percentage of registered voters. If enough signatures are collected for a petition audit – Cleek estimated it would take about 1,600 – the political subdivision requesting the audit would be responsible for footing the bill, a proposition Cleek said he’s trying to avoid.

“I have been working on it, trying to get anybody and everybody who will listen to give us an audit for free,” he said. “If they would still do it – anything I can get done for free, I’ll take it. The problem is money.”

Audit results could be used as evidence in the case against Scrivener.

District shakeup

The charges on the fire department’s credit card were not made in Christian County – most were made in Springfield, for items such as utility bills and department store purchases – but Cleek said his county has jurisdiction because the defendant allegedly transferred money from fire department bank accounts to the credit card to pay off the charges.

If convicted of the one Class-C charge, Scrivener could face up to seven years in prison.

The case has led to some changes in the department’s official written policy, according to Ozark Fire Protection District Board President Teresa Christensen. Previous standard operating guides included generalities to cover this type of situation.

“We’ve made them specific now,” Christensen said, including guidelines on acceptable uses for district credit cards and billing procedures. “The department has been operating this way since 1985 with no problem. The way I see it, if someone wants to steal money from you, they’re going to find a way to do it.”

The alleged fraud was discovered when financial records from 2003 came up missing in July, prompting an investigation and the eventual examination by the state auditor’s office.

Four department employees have been fired in the last year, including Scrivener and Fire Chief Jake Archer. Archer and two other employees were fired for allegedly viewing inappropriate e-mail on district computers, an allegation Archer has denied.

Board member Tim Garrett resigned from the board earlier this year after disagreeing with the way Archer’s situation was handled.

Christensen said that the other two employees who were let go have since resumed work with the department, as a mediation board overturned their terminations.

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