100 years ago in Coeur d’Alene: Kootenai County officials indicted on embezzlement, ‘mutilation of public records’

From our archives, 100 years ago

A grand jury in Coeur d’Alene returned 62 indictments in a case which involved evidence of a massive, longtime “swindle” by Kootenai County officials.

The grand jury’s report “reveals a condition of financial chaos which has probably never been equaled in the annals of the state.” It was “a scathing arraignment of methods followed in the auditor’s and assessor’s offices,” said The Spokesman Review.

The indictments were issued against at least seven current and former county employees, and “arrests are momentarily expected.” The charges ranged from embezzlement to mutilation of public records.

Put simply, the grand jury found evidence that officials somehow “lost” enormous sums of county tax money, probably running into the hundreds of thousands of dollars. The extent of the problem was unclear, mostly because the account books were in such astoundingly shoddy condition. The assessor’s books were “mutilated by erasures, changes of receipts for the field report, and many of them gone and the leaves removed so it is impossible to make a correct audit.”

However, the grand jury said they found “enough existing errors to show conclusively the intent to defraud and that thereby Kootenai County lost large sums of money.”

The paper said “it is commonly believed that those arrested will plead the statute of limitations” since most of the improprieties were found in records more than three years old.