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Politics : Liberalism: Do You Agree We've Had Enough of It? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: lorne who wrote (57013)	12/22/2008 3:12:30 PM
From: Hope Praytochange	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 224737

Ohio Watchdog: Ex-AG Spent Campaign Funds on Pals By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Published: December 22, 2008 Filed at 2:40 p.m. ET COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) -- Former Attorney General Marc Dann ran a vulgar and unprofessional office and misused campaign funds to make lavish payments to friends and family, the state's government watchdog said Monday in releasing the results of a six-month investigation. Dann, a Democrat elected in 2006 on an anti-corruption platform, resigned in May amid a sexual harassment scandal in his office that included his admission that he had an affair with an employee. The report by Inspector Tom Charles said Dann hired a coterie of young women dubbed ''the Dannettes'' who were so unqualified and unprofessional in their dress and conduct that an office assistant was assigned to conduct etiquette training. Dann used his position to indulge himself and gave well-paid top jobs to aides whose only qualification was their loyalty and friendship to their boss, Charles said the report. ''While it is appalling that the office of the 'people's lawyer' should have to conduct classes on civility and decorum, we find it even more appalling that Dann hired friends and acquaintances into key management positions despite the fact that the people were unqualified or faced serious legal problems that should have raised red flags,'' the report said. Charles said he was forwarding the report to Columbus and Franklin County prosecutors, the Internal Revenue Service and the Ohio Department of Taxation, among other entities. Dann scheduled a 3 p.m. news conference to respond. Among other findings in the report, Dann: --Ballooned the size of the office's fleet of cars by buying 99 additional vehicles at a cost of $1.9 million and doling out some of the cars as perks to senior managers. --Provided BlackBerry communication devices to virtually anyone in the office who wanted them -- and in some cases to people who didn't request them and didn't use them -- at a monthly cost of $30,000. --Used state-owned airplanes 16 times, including ordering pilots to pick him up at his Youngstown home or drop him off at a cost to taxpayers of $8,175. The report also said Dann used his campaign fund to buy food, beverages, snacks, newspapers and other items virtually every day he was in office, racking up $31,474 in expenses. Charles said it appeared Dann was using the account as ''supplemental personal income.'' Soon after his election, Dann also set up a unique ''transition account'' to benefit himself and his associates, and to get around the campaign finance laws that govern typical campaign accounts, the report concluded. The account grew to include more than $195,000 in donations from businesses and individuals, including political action committees. The only transition account addressed by Ohio election law is for the governor, the report noted, saying Dann was charting new territory. All but $8,000 from that account has been spent, including about $12,000 that was spent on Dann's wife's business, Zesty Dishes. Thousands of dollars were also paid to Anthony Gutierrez, the aide at the center of the sexual harassment scandal, and to Leo Jennings, who served as Dann's communications director before being fired in the fallout of the harassment scandal, the report said. Jennings and Gutierrez were receiving their state salaries at the same time. Gutierrez also had a history of drunken driving charges, the report said. Vehicles assigned to Gutierrez were damaged on four occasions, and Gutierrez failed to file to file crash reports each time, the investigation found.