YELLOW SHEET Office of the State Auditor of Missouri Claire McCaskill

Report No. 2004-32

May 4, 2004

The following findings were noted as a result of an audit conducted by our office of the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit, Cass County, Missouri.

The Cass County Circuit Clerk prepares and submits billings for incarceration costs utilizing the Sheriff's certification of the number of days incarcerated.  In cases where the court retained the option of granting probation after 120 days, the procedure is to have the probation officer enforce collection and payment to the court.  Four of the ten cases selected involved defendants granted probation after 120 days, but no payment of costs were made through probation, and three of these four defendants had their probation revoked and were sent back to prison.  Incarceration costs for these four defendants totaled approximately $3,000, and two of these cases have exceeded the two-year limit for billing the state, resulting in lost revenue to the county of approximately $1,170.  These practices do not appear beneficial to the county since reimbursement of the incarceration costs could be requested as soon as the certification is received from the Sheriff.  Other Circuit Clerk's indicated they bill the state for incarceration costs as soon as the certification of days incarcerated is received from the Sheriff.  In addition, we noted four instances where incarceration costs, totaling approximately $8,800, were underbilled to the state.

A listing of accrued costs owed to the court is not maintained by the Circuit Clerk and monitoring procedures related to accrued costs are not adequate.  Additionally, the court has not made adequate efforts to review the status of old open items.  The December 31, 2003, open items listing includes approximately 1,700 entries and totaled over $1,140,000.  These conditions were also noted in our prior report.

The Associate Division Clerk has not established procedures to routinely follow up on outstanding checks and adequate records are not maintained to account for the individual traffic tickets issued and their ultimate disposition.  These conditions were also noted in our prior report.  Also, the court has not made adequate efforts to review the status of old open items, and deviations from the established fine and costs schedule for cases paid through the mail are not approved by the Associate Circuit Judge.

An average of approximately $44,000 was spent annually on law books, publications, and software for the law library during the three years ended December 31, 2003.  Perpetual inventory records of the law library are not maintained and an annual physical inventory of the law library is not performed.  In addition, approval of expenditures from the Law Library Fund is not documented by the Presiding Circuit Judge.  Similar conditions were also noted in our prior report.

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