| OCR Text |
Show Former Escalante City Police Chief To Stand Trial On Felony Charges KANAB Former Escalante Police Chief Kent Robinson was bound over to stand trial after an initial appearance and preliminary hearing, accused of eight separate counts relating to alleged mismanagement misman-agement of funds in excess of $17,0000 over two-and-one-half year in his capacity as lead officer of the GarfieldKane Drug Task Force. A full eight hours of witnesses and testimony were heard in the Kanab County Courthouse on Wednesday, Aug. 30. Probable cause was found to indict on two counts of theft, one of misusing public funds, one of stealing or destroying de-stroying public records and four counts of falsifying public records. The charges had been filed following fol-lowing a lengthy investigation by the Utah Division of Investigations (UDI) and the Commission on Criminal and Juvenile Justice (CCJJ). The combined testimonies of UDI Investigator Scott Mann and CCJJ analystformer grant monitor Greg Hartvigsen asserted that besides be-sides missing and unaccounted-for funds, Robinson purchased hand guns for personal use with grant money (in direct violation of grant policy), failed to pay confidential informants but forged receipts for said payments, allegedly falsified, withheld and possibly destroyed receipts re-ceipts and documentation of the financial fi-nancial accounting for the task force. Hartvigsen testified he spent untold hours restructuring the business busi-ness records and transactions of over two years of the now defunct task force. He said that during that period, approximately $200,000 of combined grant monies and drug seizuresforfeitures passed through Task Force accounting. Robinson was represented by attorney at-torney Marcus Taylor of Richfield. Prosecuting for the state of Utah was Colin Winchester, Kane County Attorney. Former Kane County Sheriff Maxwell Jackson was a primary witness and experienced the most lengthy examination of the day. Jackson was employed in Kane County for six years before he was voted out of office in December of 1994. Presently working as the Chief of Police of Harrisville in Weber County, Jackson was questioned ques-tioned extensively about his knowledge knowl-edge and working relationship with the defendant over their nearly two-and-one-half years of working together toge-ther on the combined drug task force. Attorney Marcus Taylor queried Jackson extensively about the formation for-mation of the GarfieldKane Drug Task Force, the policies it adopted and guidelines followed. The Task Force was made up of six southern Utah law enforcement agencies including in-cluding the Garfield County Sheriff Department, Panguitch City Police, Escalante Police Department, Orderville Marshall's Office, Kane County Sheriffs Office and the Kane County Police and was based in Kanab. Also paid through grant monies were Task Force employees Shawn Nielsen, a full time agent and paralegal aide Ginger Kitchen. Jackson explained that a grant document doc-ument was prepared each year and these persons were requested in that process. Through Jackson's testimony, Taylor emphasized that it was Sheriff Maxwell Jackson and then paralegal aideinvestigator Ginger Kitchen who signed every check that passed through Task Force accounting. ac-counting. The defense stuck to the premise that Jackson and others should have been held more accountable ac-countable and possibly should have done a better job of monitoring Task Force transactions. Taylor said "at least, it was poor recordkeeping." record-keeping." Taylor also pointed out that during dur-ing the time in question the Task Force experienced an audit by the independent auditing firm of Kimble and Roberts and two on-site visits from grant monitor Greg Hartvigsen of CCJJ. No "black marks" were received from either audit process, he said. Asked how funds were distributed dis-tributed to the Task Force, Jackson stated that "you submit the grant request re-quest and they grade it like an English paper and divvy out the money accordingly." Taylor asked what monies Jackson received from the Task Force and Jackson responded re-sponded that it had been mainly compensation for schooling for lodging, etc. Taylor asked if the Task Force (TF) ever purchased equipment with their funds? Jackson recalled a time when several TF members attended a "raid" school and the opportunity came up to purchase a shotgun. Actually they could purchase three shotguns and get a better price from Professional Armament (Pro Arms) in Salt Lake City. He said they obtained permission from grant overseer Laura Lewis, since generally firearms were not allowed to be purchased from grant funds. He testified that the Task Force wanted to upgrade from their one shotgun and said the two others were purchased eventually by Shawn Draper, then with the Kane County Sheriffs office and Garfield County by reimbursing the Task Force, when it was found out they could not be justified through the Task Force. Taylor established through questioning ques-tioning that Jackson and other Task Force members such as Garfield County Sheriff Than Cooper and Panguitch City Police Chief Martin Nay all had slush funds of from $1,000 up to $1500 available to pay undercover informants or make transactions as necessary. Jackson testified that officers, other than Kent Robinson, also did not receipt payoffs to undercover informants, but those individuals have not come under investigation. Through questioning, Taylor elicited testimony from Jackson that frequently, in multi-agency undercover operations, equipment can get lost or taken home mistakenly mistak-enly by other officers and never accounted ac-counted for. Jackson, in reference (See Police Chief Bound Over On Charges Page 8A) Police Chief Bound Over From Page 1 to funds and equipment questions, stated "the types of records kept by the Task Force was kind of an evolving thing." CCJJ kept us informed, in-formed, told us to "tighten up here and there," said Jackson. .."let's just say we were constantly trying to improve." Asked about his recollections of guns bought through the Task Force by Robinson, specifically two .45-caliber pistols and a .38-special, .38-special, Jackson said he "did not authorize those purchases." Jackson Jack-son testified that from Jan. 1991 through Sept. 1993, Robinson was the "financial officer and was bonded" for the financial transactions transac-tions of the Task Force. The state's second witness was Shawn Draper, currently a Utah Highway Patrol officer located in Ogden and previously a deputy, then lieutenant with the Kane County Sheriffs office. Winchester clarified some of the gun questions with this Draper, first that he had reimbursed $500 to the Task Force for his shotgun. Draper was asked if Robinson had traded a .45-caliber compact Smith & Wesson to him for two dogs. Draper acknowledged that he had, two purebred German shepherd pups worth $300 each. Additional questions about equipment, equip-ment, including a scope, scanner, radios and stereos, followed. Taylor established with Draper that at some point Draper went through receipts from the Task Force and found that numerous times bills were paid by the Sheriffs office that should have been paid by the Task Force. Taylor also established in his questioning ques-tioning with Draper that the auditing audi-ting firm of Kimble and Roberts never complained about missing funds; stressing that an audit should have turned that up. In cross examination, however, Winchester brought out that the independent audit had noted that "one man (Robinson) doing all of these things (financial transactions) was not an accepted money management manage-ment practice." |
