Reply With QuoteHa! "We take corruption very seriously.". When it is $10-50 bucks perhaps, but not when it involves big numbers or political contributors.
SPARE ME MR.DYSTER!
b.b.
NIAGARA FALLS — Tina Pugh says she “begged” her bosses at Falls City Hall not to put her in a position where she had access to cash.
“I begged them not to put me around money,” Pugh told Falls police detectives just before she was arrested for the second time for stealing cash from the City Clerk’s office.
Pugh now faces charges of falsifying business records and petit larceny for a scheme that involved pocketing fees for licenses for everything from dogs to stationary engineers. She is free on her own recognizance and is scheduled to return to court on Aug. 8.
When she go back to court, she’ll have a plea offer from District Attorney Michael Violante on the table. On a plea slip signed by the DA himself, Pugh has been offered a deal that allows her to have the felony falsifying business records charge against her dropped in return for a guilty plea to the petit larceny charge.
However, in a handwritten note, Violante indicates the deal is conditioned on Pugh leaving her city hall job.
“Defendant must resign her position with City of Niagara Falls,” Violante wrote. “Defendant has prior ACD (adjournment in contemplation of dismissal) for stealing from City of Niagara Falls.”
Pugh, 34, pleaded guilty in December 2007 to stealing $30 from the clerk’s office. She paid the money back but the city fired her.
That dismissal was later overturned by an arbitrator, who sided with Pugh’s union, Local 9434-00 of the United Steelworkers, which claimed the firing was “excessive punishment.” The city appealed the ruling, but a State Supreme Court justice upheld the arbitrator’s decision.
“I think the city’s position (in that case) has been vindicated,” Mayor Paul Dyster said. “We don’t have jobs for people who can’t be honest.”
The investigation into Pugh’s thefts was conducted by Internal Affairs detectives at the Falls Police Department. In an interview with detectives, Pugh outlined an elaborate scheme to grab cash from the clerk’s office.
She told investigators one scam was to short-change dog licenses.
“I would charge the person $12.50 (the correct dog license fee) and then write it up as a senior citizen,” Pugh said. “The charges would only be $2.50 (then) and I would keep the difference.”
Pugh also said she kept the money for stationary engineer’s licenses “because the computer system would not show the income if you didn’t change the date.”
“The fees were $40, $50, $60 dollars,” Pugh said. If the dogs were in the pound, you have to come to us at the clerk’s office and pay $50. I just didn’t record them.”
Pugh returned to work in the fall of 2009 and told investigators she had been ripping off the city “on and off” since November 2009.
“I would just put the money in my pocket,’ she said.
Dyster said he hoped Pugh’s latest arrest would “send a message” to any other city employee who might be involved in “questionable activities.”
“I hope people, by now, realize we take the issue of corruption very seriously,” the mayor said, “and we’re not afraid to investigate it.”
Ha! "We take corruption very seriously.". When it is $10-50 bucks perhaps, but not when it involves big numbers or political contributors.
SPARE ME MR.DYSTER!
b.b.
Originally Posted by BorderBob
I hear Dyster is the best Mayor in NF IN YEARS. Anyone who's name doesn't in in a vowel has to be the peoples mayor and not a mayor of Corruption.
Anello
Elia
Galie
Paillio etc....
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