Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, August 4, 1995 TAG: 9508040067
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LAURA LAFAY LANDMARK NEWS SERVICE
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Angelone, chief of Nevada's prison system from 1989 to 1994, "exceeded his authority in granting full-time compensation for part-time employment," according to Nevada's Division of Internal Audits.
"Management correspondence indicates that this was accepted practice for certain employees," the report said.
But a letter released by the auditor as evidence of that claim does not specifically outline such an arrangement. Written by a prison psychologist who also worked as a psychology professor in Fresno, Calif., it instead asks for approval "for the work I do in Fresno, Ca."
Angelone said Thursday that the audit was ``sloppy'' and inaccurate. The letter, which he approved, was a routine request for secondary employment, he said. It was not a request for full-time money for part-time work.
"I have to assume the auditor must not have known what that piece of paper was, and that he just made his own assumptions, not knowing that every employee that has a second job must have that signed," he said. "I signed about 300 of those a year, approving or disapproving requests to take a second job. The auditor never called me for clarification of the audit, or explanation, or verification of what was in the audit."
John P. Comeaux, who oversees Nevada's Division of Internal Audits, conceded that auditors "maybe should" have talked to Angelone. But, he said, his auditors "did not have any axes to grind. They based their conclusions on what they saw in black and white."
Angelone said he himself ordered the audit of the medical division before leaving for Virginia in the spring of 1994.
The results were released July 6. Among the findings: Of 25 contracts in force at the medical division, one violated the department's nepotism regulations, nine were intentionally split to avoid review by the state's Board of Examiners, and seven had no documentation of the required bidding process.
In June, the two people in charge of the division left their jobs. The director, George Kaiser, retired. The mental health director, James Michael Nelson, was fired for not cooperating with the auditors. Another psychologist also refused to cooperate and was put on administrative leave.
The audit prompted an investigation into the medical division by the Nevada Department of Investigations. David Alfred, criminal investigator in charge of the case, describes a system in which health care workers milked the department for money and benefits while providing little care to inmates.
"Dr. Nelson had hired his little loop of people - most of them from California that he knew - and they were given special benefits," Alfred said.
"They did not work a 40-hour week. A lot weren't even working as much as four hours a week, and they were making anything from $64,000 to $100,000 a year. We had one psychiatrist who lived in Las Vegas and his duty station was in Carson City. According to him, he would work four to six days a month. And he charged us for air fare and accommodations. I found out he wasn't even working here two or three days a month."
The supervising psychologist at one of the prisons lived and worked full-time in California while holding down a full-time job at the department of prisons, Alfred said.
"If you were going to boil it all down and put it in one lump, it's just a lack of administrative control," he said.
Angelone supervised Kaiser, who in turn, supervised the medical division and Nelson.
"We're talking about professional people," Angelone said Thursday. "You don't have to look over their shoulders ... [Nelson] worked 500 miles away from the central office. You do this by time sheets, and you can only assume that the time sheets are being filled out properly."
Nevada Attorney General Frankie Sue Del Papa, whose office will prosecute if any charges result from the investigation, said Thursday, "I talked to my staff members, and my understanding is that Ron called our office right after the audit came out and said that he was very upset with the report that he authorized the payment for part-time work."
In Virginia, Angelone's boss, Secretary of Public Safety Jerry Kilgore, said: "I have confidence in Director Angelone, and we're not involved in the Nevada audit, and we weren't informed about it until today.
``He's doing a good job here in Virginia and a good job for us."
by CNB