PORT ANGELES — A Clallam County Superior Court jury has just found Catherine Betts, former county Treasurer’s Office cashier, guilty on all counts of embezzling more than $617,000.
Details coming.
Earlier report:
By Paul Gottlieb
Peninsula Daily News
PORT ANGELES — Either Catherine Betts’ opportunistic greed knew no bounds, or she was part of a Clallam County Treasurer’s Office from 2003 to 2009 in which record-keeping was so poor that any employee —or employees — could have stolen at least $617,467 in public funds.
Those were the competing pictures painted by opposing counsel — defense attorney Harry Gasnick and Scott Marlow of the state Attorney General’s Office — as they began closing arguments Tuesday afternoon in Clallam County Superior Court.
Betts, a 47-year-old former Treasurer’s Office cashier, is accused of money-laundering, aggravated first-degree theft and 19 separate charges of filing false or fraudulent tax returns with the state Department of Revenue on behalf of Clallam County.
In testimony earlier Tuesday, Betts had difficulty explaining records of large deposits in her bank account that allegedly approached $10,000 at a time.
“I wasn’t aware,” Betts said, noting she had been doing “a lot of cash advances” from her credit card.
“I don’t know. I find it hard to believe.”
Judge Brooke Taylor recessed the trial at 4:45 p.m. Tuesday.
At 9 this morning, the jury is expected to hear about 20 more minutes of closing argument from Gasnick and about 15 minutes of rebuttal from Marlow before beginning deliberations later this morning at the courthouse at 223 E. Fourth St., Port Angeles.
Twelve jurors are expected to begin deliberating by mid-morning today, Taylor said Tuesday.
“This is a very intimidating set of instructions in terms of volume,” Taylor said of the 50 pages of instructions and the numerous boxes of evidence stacked about the courtroom.
While it’s been more than two years since Betts was first charged, the crime is still the fifth-largest theft of public funds in Washington state since 2000, state Auditor’s Office spokeswoman Mindy Chambers said last week.
Betts, who now lives in Shelton, took the stand Monday and completed her testimony Tuesday.
She has claimed she took $877 and denied taking what a state Auditor’s Office investigation determined was at least $617,467 in missing funds from June 1, 2003, to May 30, 2009.
“I just put the check in my basket and exchanged it for the cash in my drawer,” she said Tuesday of the $877.
The investigation determined that as much as $793,595 could have been stolen, the difference being “questionable transactions” that could not be explained, according to the investigation.
Gasnick and Loren Oakley, both from Clallam-Jefferson Public Defenders, have argued that Treasurer’s Office employees at that time shared passwords and computer terminals, making it virtually impossible to determine who stole what.
But Marlow, a state assistant attorney general, has claimed that over six years, Betts allegedly altered documents, created phantom spreadsheets and exchanged cash from her cash drawer with far more than that one check from the public for real estate excise taxes.
Marlow said Tuesday that Auditor’s Office investigator Jim Brittain testified there were more than “1,000 instances of improper taking.”
Betts must be convicted of stealing at least $5,000 for a conviction of first-degree theft.
Under cross-examination by Marlow on Tuesday, Betts was unable to explain what Marlow said were large sums “that approached $100,000, mostly in cash, in the Bank of America” in Port Angeles.
Marlow also questioned how $877 could serve as “getaway” money that would allow Betts to escape her husband.
When caught in May 2009, she allegedly told fellow employees she needed the money to leave him.
“I don’t know exactly what was going through my mind at the time,” Betts said on the stand.
“It was a stupid thing to do, that’s all I can say.”
In his closing argument, Marlow said Betts “totally took advantage” of being the office cashier and was “making up those checks” to hide the thefts when she balanced Treasurer’s Office transactions.
“This is a simple case of greed; it’s a simple case of someone taking advantage,” Marlow said.
“She was making up those checks, that’s one thing that Jim Brittain proved. Checks she said existed that she relied on to balance on a daily basis didn’t exist.”
Marlow did not say in his closing argument what Betts allegedly spent the money on, and he has declined to comment on the case during the trial.
Gasnick, in the portion of his closing argument he gave Tuesday, questioned what happened to that $600,000.
The house Betts lives in, the car she drives, household items — nothing indicates she lives a “high lifestyle,” Gasnick said.
“A lot of this case does come down to if Catherine Betts did what she is accused of, where is the money? Where is this $600,000? What’s showing for it?”
He said every Treasurer’s Office employee had access to the office’s computer records “from virtually any computer in the office” and could sign on using other employees’ names.
“What we have is an office that is just slapping junk out there,” Gasnick said.
“There is no supervision. This is an extraordinarily poorly run operation would be the most generous characterization one could use.”
Then-Treasurer Judy Scott, who has testified in the trial, declined Tuesday night to comment on the testimony.
Scott instituted tighter control after the thefts were discovered but lost re-election in November to Selinda Barkhuis.
Barkhuis has since issued a 30-page manual on office procedures.
“Now, every single step and every process is either reviewed daily or randomly and regularly,” she told the Peninsula Daily News on Friday.
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Senior Staff Writer Paul Gottlieb can be reached at 360-417-3536 or at paul.gottlieb@peninsuladailynews.com.
