PATTAYA, Thailand – The Pattaya City Expats Club (PCEC) periodically asks members to share some of their life experiences. At the August 20th meeting, member Darrel Vaught shared his experiences and insights from his involvement in three court trials in the United States. These occurred during his 30-year career as an auditor with the Office of Inspector General (OIG) of the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).
Darrel recounted his role in two criminal trials involving embezzlement at the Kiowa Tribe Housing Authority (KHA) and one civil trial where HUD was the defendant. His testimony at the 3 trials was based on audit work he performed before moving on in his career to supervisory and management positions.
Darrel began by noting the two criminal trials involved embezzlement of funds by the KHA’s former Executive Director and former Chairman of the Board of Commissioners. He mentioned that each had their own schemes, thus the reason for two trials. He gave a brief background about former Indian reservations in Oklahoma and how they evolved into “trust” lands. The KHA received HUD money to provide individual houses on a plot of trust land held by low-income tribal members.
In the first of the two trials, he described how the Executive Director embezzled money using a special bank account. He testified to his 1976 audit work to identify the means she and her husband (a co-defendant) used to embezzle about US 20,000 dollars. Although some problems were encountered during the court proceedings along with challenges by the defendants’ attorney during cross examination, the jury did find both defendants guilty after the 5-day trial with both receiving prison sentences.
In the second trial, he noted that the embezzlement scheme involved the Chairman and his cousin. At the Chairman’s direction, his cousin made numerous billings to the KHA for drilling water wells and constructing fences on the land plots which his audit work found not to exist. In obtaining the necessary evidence he described how he located each plot to inspect which were scattered on rural roads across 4 counties.
During the trial, the defense attorney challenged him on how his being a “city boy he was sure he had found the correct plot of land to inspect. His answer was not what the attorney expected as he noted he grew up in Oklahoma and was in fact a “country boy” because during his youth, he spent his many summers on his grandparents’ farm. This farm was in a similar rural area, much like that where the land plots he inspected were located. After the four-day trial, the Jury found the Chairman and his cousin both guilty of embezzling more than US 50,000 dollars and the judge sentenced them to 10 years in state prison.
Darrel ended his presentation describing the nature of a civil trial in Federal Court in Baton Rouge, Louisiana in 1979. HUD was sued by a corporation for unpaid construction fees of about US 100,000 dollars related to an apartment project. HUD had insured mortgage advances, but withheld approval of a final advance, thus not providing the remaining funds due under the construction contract.
In his testimony, Darrel described his audit work that revealed false statements by the owner/officers of the corporation, who were also general partners in the mortgagor entity, that he uncovered in an audit conducted in 1973. He also described the testimony of another witness that supported HUD’s counter suit for US 80,000 dollars for damages caused by faulty construction. The non-jury trial lasted one day. About two months later, the judge rendered his verdict; HUD not liable to the contractor, but the contractor owed HUD the damages sued for due to faulty construction.
After the presentation, MC Ren Lexander brought everyone up to date on upcoming PCEC events followed by the Open Forum where audience members can make comments or ask questions about Expat living in Thailand. To learn more about the PCEC, visit their website at www.pcec.club. To view a video of Darrel’s presentation on the PCEC’s YouTube channel, visit https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P0qoGklmUyE&t=243s.
