The complaint accuses Tim Russell, who worked closely with Walker when he was Milwaukee County Executive, of diverting more than $21,000 to his personal bank account and using some of the money to go on Hawaiian and Caribbean vacations.
http://liarcatchers.com/fraud_investigation.html
Another man, Kevin Kavanaugh, also faces fraud charges linked to the case. Russell’s domestic partner, Brian Pierick, faces charges of child enticement that prosecutors said came to light in the investigation.
Russell and Kavanaugh are accused of misappropriating funds from 2006 to 2009 from Operation Freedom, a military appreciation event held each year at the Milwaukee County Zoo.
The charges were announced days before a deadline in an effort to recall Walker, a first-term Republican who pushed strict limits on the power of public sector unions through the Wisconsin legislature last year, setting off a national debate.
Walker’s critics need to collect 540,208 signatures by January 17 to force the recall vote.
Russell, who was Walker’s deputy chief of staff and then housing director of the Milwaukee County’s Department of Health and Human Services, faces two felony counts and a misdemeanor count of embezzlement.
In addition to the vacations, Russell is accused of using embezzled funds to attend a weekend political strategy session in 2010 with Herman Cain and his chief of staff Mark Block to discuss Cain’s now-defunct U.S. presidential campaign.
CONCERNS OVER FUNDS
The probe began when Tom Nardelli, Walker’s chief of staff in Milwaukee, voiced concerns about the funds being collected by Operation Freedom.
“Mr. Nardelli, with my support, asked the Milwaukee County district attorney to investigate those concerns,” Walker said in a statement on Thursday. “We appreciate learning that the district attorney’s office investigated those concerns.”
Walker originally ran the Operation Freedom event through his county office and Russell coordinated it for him. The event was later turned over to the Milwaukee Purple Heart, a nonprofit group that serves veterans, after Walker got legal advice that it should be handled by a charitable organization.
In addition to the embezzlement accusations linked to Operation Freedom, Russell is also accused of stealing funds from two Milwaukee County Board candidates in 2007 and 2010.
Kavanaugh, who served on the Milwaukee County Veteran Service Commission, was charged with fraudulent writings and embezzlement. According to the criminal complaint, Kavanaugh embezzled more than $42,000 from the Military Order of the Purple Heart, a charity involved in Operation Freedom.
Pierick, a staffer at the state Department of Public Instruction, was charged with child enticement and causing a child to expose his genitals.
Pierick worked as an office operations assistant for education for homeless youth at DPI, according to the agency’s website. He was fired on Thursday, said a DPI spokesman.
