YELLOW SHEET Office of the State Auditor of Missouri Claire McCaskill

July 17, 2003

Report No. 2003-70

St. Louis Sheriff's office needs to tighten procedures for property room evidence and  land tax sales, while ensuring all office accounts run through the city treasury

The audit report's 14 findings cover several facets of the St. Louis Sheriff's office including: property room evidence, land tax sales, prisoner transportation costs, bank accounts held outside the city treasury, vehicle purchases, serving of civil processes, and cell phone use.  Responsibilities of the 182 employees of the Sheriff's office include: transporting prisoners between jail and court, providing courtroom security, serving civil processes, collecting  and storing criminal evidence, issuing handgun permits and jury duty slips, and selling real estate with delinquent property taxes.  The Sheriff's office agreed with the recommendations in 12 of the 14 findings, and has already implemented several of the recommendations.  

Some property room money kept in outside account and used for office purchases

In April 1989, the Sheriff established a bank account outside the city treasury to handle money in the property room no longer needed as evidence.  Between 1989 and 1995, nearly $200,000 from the property room went into this interest-bearing account.  The office used this account to pay for uniforms, training, handguns, cell phones, and other items.  The office closed the account in 1995, but then used an additional $69,000 from the property room between 1997 and 2002 to purchase cashier's checks for alarm, filing, and shelving systems, as well as uniforms.  (See page 5)

In addition, the Sheriff's office has continued to hold seized money in the property room, about $660,000 as of September 2002, which state law requires to be turned over to the state after a certain time period.  Several state laws address the correct disposition of the seized property.  City and state officials are in litigation over which entity should receive the unneeded property money.  (See page 7)

Inadequate property room tracking did not show final disposition of all items

None of the cash envelopes deposited in the outside account or used for cashier's checks were marked as to their final disposition.  Between 1993 and 1995, no one recorded the exact amount of money in the cash envelopes.  The tracking system also did not include enough information on seized evidence to trace appropriate holding periods as set by state law.  (See page 11)

Better record keeping needed for land tax sales and fee collections

The Sheriff's office handles all sales of property with unpaid real estate taxes, which totaled $3.1 million in revenues during the 2001 and 2002 fiscal years.  However, auditors noted numerous errors in distributions and fees regarding such sales.  Since 1997, these errors included about $400,000 that never went to the City Collector as required and about $270,000 in overpayments to the Collector.  Because land tax sales often generate proceeds in excess of the back taxes, state law requires the Collector receive excess proceeds that go unclaimed for two years.  (See page 14)   In addition, auditors found significant weaknesses in the land tax sales accounting controls and procedures.  (See page 19)

State overbilled for some prisoner transportation

The Sheriff's office over billed the state at least $26,444 on some of the 400 prisoner transportation trips made in fiscal years 2001 and 2002.  For each prisoner transported, the Sheriff's office is reimbursed a per deim plus round trip mileage for each guard involved.  On some trips, the Sheriff's office billed for three guards, even though no more than two guards ever made the trip  On other trips, the mileage reimbursement request exceeded the actual mileage driven.  (See page 23)

Private process server account used by Sheriff's office for office supplies   

Initially, fees generated from training and licensing citizens who want to serve civil process papers were deposited in a separate bank account held outside the city treasury.  The Sheriff's office also spent money from this separate account without city comptroller approval.  The Sheriff's office closed this account in August 2002 and paid remaining monies to the city treasurer.  However, account expenditures are still not approved by the city comptroller, as required by state law.  City treasury officials told auditors as long as the account balance covered the Sheriff's office checks, they signed the checks.  (See page 27)

Main bank account maintained on labor intensive, all-paper, manual system

The nearly $16.5 million in revenues and $16.3 million in expenditures of the Sheriff's office over  fiscal years 2001 and 2002 is recorded in a labor-intensive, paper-based system of logs, journals, and ledgers.  Each month, the Sheriff's office totals how much they will turn over to the city and reconciles financial activity to bank activity.  Conversion to an automated receipts and disbursement system would allow greater efficiency and early error detection.  (See page 30)

Office could have spent less on new vehicles

The Sheriff's office could have saved money on two recent vehicle purchases, including a $42,486 prisoner transportation van which they could have bought for about $32,000.  State corrections department staff recently purchased transportation vans for no more than $23,600.  The Sheriff's office followed city vehicle purchasing policies, but could have asked to add a vendor to the list.  Additional vendors could have included  those responding to the state cooperative procurement with less expensive vehicles.  (See page 32)

Complete Audit Report