The former honcho of the Allen County Regional Transit Authority has been slapped with an indictment, with the Allen County Grand Jury charging Sheila F. Haney with snagging nearly $27,000 that wasn't hers to take. Ohio's Auditor of State Keith Faber spilled the beans on this development. Haney is staring down the barrel of seven felony counts, including but not limited to theft in office, tampering with records, and telecommunications fraud, per the paperwork filed at the Allen County Common Pleas Court.
Our friends at the Auditor's office got wise to some funny business with the cash flow from the sale of vehicles that had seen better days and, separately, when they picked Haney's expense reports apart, discrepancies that could not be ignored were identified, triggering an investigation by the Auditor of State’s Special Investigations Unit (SIU). After planting roots as a contracted executive director in September 2012, Haney climbed the ladder, sealing the deal as a full-time employee by September 2019, and waved goodbye to the position in February 2020, SIU barristers and Auditor Faber snagging a special prosecutor gig courtesy of the Allen County Prosecutor's Office for this case.
The hard-hitting team at the SIU is not one to blow their own trumpet. Still, since 2019, they've notched 130 convictions, clawing back over $10 million in restitution—you can peep the stats on the Map of SIU Convictions since January 2019. They get their heads down and sift through a pile of tips on the alleged dodgy dealings every year. For those in the know, you can drop a dime on the sly online or give SIU’s fraud hotline a buzz at 866-FRAUD-OH (866-372-8364).
The Ohio Auditor of State Keith Faber's Office might not be the name on everybody's lips. Still, they're heavy hitters in Ohio, keeping an eagle eye on more than 5,900 state and local government outfits headed by the watchful Keith Faber. They don't just crunch numbers. They're on the lookout for fraudsters, working to keep government dealings honest and out in the open—according to the press release from the Auditor's page, their mandate is clear cut and pretty damn expansive when it comes to looking after the public purse and flagging up fraud.
