Opinion ID: 629120
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Dive Team Transaction

Text: 21 On August 24, 1988, two days before the delivery of Coyne's new Mercury Sable, John H. Kearney sent a letter to Coyne requesting a $5,000 appropriation for the Five Chiefs Search and Recovery Dive Team. Coyne told his budget director to put a line item for $5,000 into the executive budget, which was represented as an amount requested by the Albany County Department of Natural Disasters and Civil Defense (Civil Defense Department). In fact, Coyne did not consult the Civil Defense Department. The $5,000 was eventually included in Albany County's 1989 budget. 22 In late 1988, the Five Chiefs changed their name to the Coeymans Dive Rescue Team. Kearney resigned from the Coeymans team in March 1989. In the summer of 1989, the Coeymans dive team made numerous requests for the money to purchase equipment but never received funding. However, in April 1990, Coyne announced that he had formed a new dive team, the Albany County Dive Team. Equipment had been purchased by the County for this team beginning in December 1989. Although the director of the Civil Defense Department and his assistant were the only ones authorized to sign the requisitions for this equipment, they did not do so. Rather, Kearney, who was not a county employee, signed the director's name and then initialed it. 23 In 1988, Albany County received $24,604,072 in federal financial assistance. None of this money was earmarked for the purchase of cars or equipment for dive teams. 24