The Prescott daily news., 1915-07-15
REPORT ON ATTOR-
 NEY GENERALS OF-
 FICE MADE PUBLIC
Special Committe Says Attorney General Deserves Severe Criticism and Condemnation for Using Trust Company for Depository.


 pected report of the Special Investi- gating Committee on the office of the Attorney general was made public Wednesday evening. It is signed by Senator George w. Garrett and Rep Iresentatives Monroe Smith and U. A. Gentry. Their conclusions are as fol- lows:
 We find that the Attorney general has kept very inadequate records of money received and paid into the State Treasury;
 That he has used the Southern Trust Company as a sub treasury or depository for most of the funds that have come into his possession and checked them out indiscriminately with bank checks in face of the sta tute against his depositing the money or the bank receiving it.
 That he has dealt in state war rants;"
 "That he has employed Special OouilSSl stI d NoSC Ol lllOIe liidH ? ,OOO in one instance, when he could have done the work himself in less than seven hours and saved the amount o the tax payers;
 "That while he was employing spec tial counsel he was doing private prac- tice;
 That he failed to comply with the law in not itemizing his inheritance tax collections in his Biennial report"
 Attention is called that while the Attorney General is not a bonded off, cer, he collects from $75,000 to $100,- 1000 annually. land instead of remit ting this direct to the Treasury, as he is commanded by law to do, it has been his custom to deposit the greater portion of tEese collections in the Southern Trust Company, and keep it there for many, many months, dribb- ling into the Treasury what he has not checked to other sources on var ious and Sundry personal checks. The ! lected in Inheritnce and Franchise tax | Keeping no record of the money, when he receives it. or the names of the in- 1 ldividuals by whom it is paid, and wait ing so long to pay it into the Treasury the reuslt is that he forgets the names of many of the estates from which he hoo ooIIaooJ obor;topao +ovac oDd ot,r accountants found in their efforts to banalance his accounts that he had $2, ,236.96 in the Southern Trust Com pany more than he could account for. When this fact was discovered, the Attorney General came to this Com mittee and suggested that as he had more money than he knew what to do with, he felt that he ought not to be criticised for that, because it show ed he thought, that he had not used any of he states money for his own personal benefit"
 It is shown that there is a balance of $8,365.2 due on delinquent fran chise taxes, which it is the Attorney generals duty to collect. Just why this amount has not been collected we are not satiss actorily advised by the Attorney general, and as it stands this amount is a clear loss to the state" says the Committee. Up to June p he had paid into the Treasury Inheri- topca Tay amountinp to SQ3 TAI go and from Sand and Gravel and other sources 42,000.15. A total of $11,- 431.02 has been paid special counsel.
 With reference to the excess of S2,- 236.O6 the Committee says: "The At torney General being unable to tell what this fund should be credited to in the Treasurers office, he was unable to turn it over to the Treasurer, and he informed us that he had placed 1t in the Savings Department of the Southern Trust Company to the ac- count of w. L. Moose, Attorney Gen. eral, marked Public Funds where it is now drawing per cent interest. We feel the Attorney General deserves the severest criticism and condemna- tion for using the Southern Trust Company as a depository for public funds"
 The Committee says: "Such prac- tice, it will certainly appear from the statutes, is a violation of the criminal | AI- II.