Special Investigative Report: Part 3
Where did DA ‘training funds’ go?
BY MIKE BUFFINGTON
EDITOR
District Attorney Tim Madison mandated that a staff member pay several thousand dollars of his local salary supplement to a “training fund,” according to the former employee. But the disposition of that money is unclear and no official “training fund” was apparently ever created.
The staff member, a former assistant district attorney who has since left the Piedmont Judicial Circuit District Attorney’s office, said he was told by Madison to pay part of his local salary supplement “to defray training expenses” while he was in the Banks County district attorney’s office.
The former staffer, whose identity is being kept confidential by The Herald, reportedly went to the Georgia Attorney General’s Office to discuss the payments after he was contacted by the newspaper several weeks ago.
The former ADA said he had been assigned to the Banks County office, where he began receiving a local supplement to his salary from that county. He said Madison told him to keep $1,000 per month from the supplement, but to turn over the rest of the county salary supplement for a “training fund” account.
“I paid all I was told to pay,” said the former employee.
Based on Banks County pay records for the former employee obtained by The Herald through an open records request, around $10,000 was likely paid by the employee for the “training fund.” The employee said he gave all the checks he wrote for the “training fund” to Madison.
NOT SENT TO COUNTY
Banks County records indicate that none of those funds were subsequently reimbursed to the county for any county-paid training expenses. The records also indicate that Banks County paid out only $2,300 in training expenses for all DA staffers from 2002-2006.
“Our records do not show any reimbursements paid by any employee in the district attorney’s office to this office as a result of any employment contractual arrangement with the district attorney,” said a memo from Banks County in response to a Herald open records request.
It is not clear what other accounts the funds may have been deposited into. Madison has said his office kept no bank statements or other bank records for a Wachovia account that was used to manage some Banks County drug forfeiture funds. The Herald is continuing its efforts to get those Wachovia bank records, along with other bank documents that were apparently disposed of by the DA’s office.
As reported last week, Madison is also said to have received payments from staff members who broke employment contracts they signed when Madison hired them. No details about the disposition of those payments has been forthcoming from Madison, despite repeated requests by The Herald for such documentation.
Several former staff members did, however, confirm to The Herald that they had written checks to Madison at the time they left employment in the Piedmont District Attorney’s Office.
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