Hermann Hearsay: Investigative Report Follow-up - Improper Use of County Owned Computers Alleged By Local Man

Monday, May 24, 2010

Investigative Report Follow-up - Improper Use of County Owned Computers Alleged By Local Man

Published by Jimmy Oldsun, NDRIRSRWRAFTC & Editor

On April 29, Hermann Hearsay ran a report on the improper use of Gasconade County assets. In that article, we specifically focused on the improper use of county-owned computers to conduct personal business and send out political emails.

For easy reference, you may click on the following link to read what we reported at that time:

http://www.hermannhearsay.blogspot.com/2010/04/investigative-report-improper-use-of.html

At that time, we reported that six (6) personal emails originated by an elected county official and sent from her county-owned computer during regular office hours had been referred to us by an irate citizen and loyal HH subscriber who just happened to receive them when they were forwarded on to him by one of the original recipients of the emails. Since our first report, an additional email has surfaced and it has been forwarded on to us. We are now in receipt of a total of seven (7) such personal emails which were sent by the same public official from her county-owned computer during regular office hours. There could very well be more of these kind of emails, and we are searching to find them.

The list of emails which have come to our attention thus far is reproduced hereinbelow:

Date: Fri, 19 Feb 2010 16:29:59 (Subject: Republican Pachyderm Club, Lincoln Day Flier)
Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2010 11:56:41 (Subject: Article "Organizing Kids for Barack Obama")
Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 08:44:18 (Subject: Article "After America , There is No Place to Go")
Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 09:44:32 (Subject: Article "Barack Obama Has Awakened a Sleeping Nation")
Date: Tue, 13 Apr 2010 08:25:21 (Subject: Food Nutrition Chart)
Date: Tue, 27 Apr 2010 08:18:11 (Subject: Article "British Press Report on Obama's G-20 Summit Meeting Trip")
Date: Tue, 18 May 2010 08:18:57 (Subject: Fw: Very, Very, Serious Warning)

All of these emails are personal emails (most of a political nature) as opposed to county business emails. All of these emails were sent during normal office hours at the County Courthouse and were therefore presumably sent from a county-owned computer or computers. Hermann Hearsay has in our possession copies of the emails and has confirmed that the subject matter of the emails is of a personal and political nature and not of a county business nature We have confirmed that the email address of the originator is that of a certain elected county official. We are withholding the name of the county official at this time pending further investigation.

There is a lot more to be investigated and checked out with regard to this important story. A number of questions remain. For example:

Are there anymore personal emails like this which were originated by this particular county official during regular office hours? What is the nature of these personal emails?
What other personal business has been conducted over the internet or otherwise during regular office hours by this particular county official?
Are there other county officials who are using county assets (such as telephones, vehicles, etc.) to conduct personal business during regular work hours? Are county assets being "loaned out" to county officials or employees for their personal use on weekends or at other times? If so, who is involved?
Do written policies which govern proper and ethical business conduct by our county officials and employees even exist? If such policies exist either by Missouri state statute or by county policy, are our county officials and employees aware of them?
What does the Missouri Ethics Commission have to say about such personal and political use of public assets by public officials during regular office hours when they should be doing the People's business rather than their own personal business?
If a county official has the time to spend on personal matters and political matters during his/her normal office hours, does this indicate that his/her office may be over-staffed? Or does it indicate that the county official is negligent or at least inattentive in his/her official duties?

Whereas there are still many open questions to be investigated, and whereas Hermann Hearsay has very limited staff resources and whereas this is a very important story of great public import, we decided to share the information we have thus far gathered with certain friends in the local media. It is vitally important to get this story right and to report it to the citizens of Gasconade County. By working together and sharing information among ourselves, we reasoned that we could pursue leads and find the answers to remaining open questions much quicker than we might by working alone. Unfortunately our offer to share the information we have gathered has been turned down.

Therefore, we will pursue this story independently without collaboration with other crack investigative reporters and at our own slow-as-molasses methodical pace.

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