VICKSBURG - State Auditor Phil Bryant said if he had his way, any official caught stealing from the public would get one more freebie: An orange jumpsuit with Mississippi Department of Corrections stamped on the back.
But corruption doesn't often result in actual incarceration in this state, in part because a past state auditor was a little too aggressive, at least in the view of some lawmakers.
Today, there is a process. Here's how it goes:
1. Joe gets elected or appointed.
2. As part of the settling-in process, Joe becomes "bonded." As required by state law for all who manage public policy or money or both, a private insurance policy is purchased that pays the public back if, uh, something goes wrong.
3. Something goes wrong …. such as a representative of Bryant's office discovering that, say, an invoice a county paid for a patrol car was actually for delivery of a shiny bass boat to Joe's driveway.
4. At this point, auditors can disclose nothing to the public. Joe must be given a chance to set things right … to "undo his mistake."
5. Later, when the audit report does see the light of day, Joe may be embarrassed and be held criminally liable. But the auditor's office has no authority to prosecute. Instead, its investigative staff turns over the file to the local district attorney or to the attorney general. Sometimes they prosecute; sometimes they don't. It all depends.
A factor that often weighs heavily is whether Joe's bond has paid up for Joe's misdeed. If so, it becomes the bonding company, not the public, that is actually out something. The bonding company will sic its lawyers on Joe for a civil judgment, but isn't really interested in having Joe in jail, because that would pretty much nix any chance for repayment.
Another factor is the passage of time. For example, Bryant's office made public in November an investigation that showed flagrant abuses by former members of a Claiborne County agency that was supposed to be coordinating transportation for the poor.
The seven board members were treating themselves to a slice of the high life, paying each other $500 per hour or so ($1,000 per meeting) for their good works. Even after the state had stepped in and said, "Whoa," these board members persisted, eventually awarding themselves and others more than $200,000.
But this all happened three or four years ago. One member has since died and a couple of others have repaid or started repaying, but by the time Bryant's office was allowed to spill the beans, any community impetus for prosecution was lessened, especially since a new board is now in place and functioning within the law.
"I wish the auditor's office did have prosecution powers, but we don't," Bryant said. Instead, the paperwork will be sent to the Claiborne County DA, who may feel no pressure to prosecute. It's an old case now, not widely reported in the press and the county is getting its money back.
The built-in delays came about after the tenure of former Gov. Ray Mabus, who was an aggressive state auditor before moving to the mansion in 1988. That was also the decade of the federal Operation Pretense, in which 56 county supervisors were charged with corrupt activities.
Lawmakers were miffed with Mabus, especially about his press conferences at which charges were announced before indictments were served. Their response was to hamstring future auditors with the "keep it quiet" statutory process now in place.
More recently, perhaps in a fit of conscience, the Legislature did add Section 99-19-18 to the state code. It has the look of a major move against corruption, saying any public official convicted of taking $10,000 or more of the people's cash or other property must be sentenced to an orange jumpsuit for at least one year - "no probation or parole."
Bryant likes the "mandatory minimum," added in 2002, but fears some judges may still order house arrest, which is apparently allowed.
The much larger reality is that there can be no minimum sentence without a conviction, and there can be no conviction without a criminal charge.
The lesson in all this seems clear: Lawmakers may decry corruption, but they've established a civil process, intentionally or not, that stacks the deck in favor of those who choose to steal.
As Bryant says, Parchman is full of criminals who acted on impulse. He thinks that's where they belong. But they should also have the company of officials who mock their positions of public trust by plotting and stealing for months and years.
